Like a Moth to a Flame
by Dreaming-Of-A-Nightmare
Summary: Human!AU Butterfly Bog with bikers and bars and college classes and icky retail jobs and familiar faces and life hitting you from all sides at once to bring two people together, drawn to one another, like moths to a flame. Let's hope they don't burn for it. .:. Complete!
1. One: King's Castle

He flicks the lighter open and shut, watching the sparks ignite the flame, over and over. His long fingers are dry and cool, rough with callouses. He flicks the lighter, smooth and silver and rounded rectangular, watching the flicker of the flame reflect off its own surface. He bites down on the toothpick between his teeth, switches side, nibbles off the bent end, feels the tiny snap. He spits out the wood shard, the rest of the toothpick clenched hard between his molars.

He lights the end of the wood.

He watches the dim flame with crossed eyes, just for a moment, and before it starts to grow, he spits the toothpick to the ground and steps on it as he walks over it, leaning off the jagged brick wall behind him.

God, he misses smoking.

E-cigs or vapes or whatever people have nowadays are all shit. Percentages of nicotine, or no nicotine at all. And the smoke isn't even _smoke,_ it's just _water._ What's the point, unless it's a fuckton of chemicals that can kill? It's not nearly as satisfying.

But he promised his mother he'd quit. So he has.

…Doesn't mean he can't gripe about it, though.

With a sigh, he runs his hand through his hair and steps out of the alley, into the grimy night while he tucks his lighter and his hands into his leather jacket pockets. The air has an edge of humidity to it, happily riding that border between summer and autumn. With the promise of morning fog and the buzz of the neon outside of the bar, it almost reminds him of home.

He shoves open the door and enters the smoky indoors.

The bar is dimly lit, the main source of light at the bar itself, mostly for the bartender's benefit. He stalks over and slips behind the counter, nodding in the current 'tender's direction on his way to the kitchen door, and they smile at him in return.

Inside, he washes his hands, not bothering to get under the nails. The surface is enough. He dons an apron and gets to work.

Now, he didn't always prep and cook the food here. He was a bartender once, too, but learned quickly that he hasn't the temper to deal with the drunkards at his bar. So, instead, he opts to work behind the scenes, cooking and unloading the delivery trucks and checking inventory and running just about every damn thing besides the front counter. And he has every right to; his father passed the deed on to him, so this is his place now. He can work wherever he wants to in it, this is _his_ domain, his _castle._

"Bog," one of his oldest employees, Brutus, grunts in greeting. He grins. "You look like Hell."

He grunts back, "I live there. It's hardly anything new. What's your excuse? You _wish_ you looked half as pretty." And he pulls an especially gruesome expression.

Brutus barks a curt laugh and shakes his head. He turns to the sink beside his boss and picks up a few spatulas, starting to wash them with massive, meaty hands in sudsy, grey water. "So, what did you decide? About the whole going-back-to-school thing. The deadline to register is tomorrow, isn't it?"

Bog sighs heavily and adds more oil to the pan. He shakes it against the stovetop before turning to mince some garlic. "It is. And I just made it, by the skin of me chipped teeth. Had to defer the loan to make sure I don't lose the classes I signed up for at the last minute there." He grits his teeth. "I'm not happy about it, but if I want to keep this place from going to those mongrels who want to steal it from me, I need to finish that damn degree. What is with this country and degrees? It's's though nobody can have a business anymore 'less they prove via a teeny scrap of paper that they can handle it, or else someone'll come along and snatch it up 'cause their degree earns them a higher paycheck."

"Amen," the dishwasher agrees sadly. "Well, good luck to ya. You can at least start where you left off, yeah?"

Bog cracks his neck and sighs again, gruffer this time. "Yeah… but I dropped out early in the race. I have a good three semesters' worth of credits to go. Two if I really cram the hours in, but you know I can't. I need to be _here._ The best I can do is four classes at most, squeezed onto two days a week."

"Tough break," the stocky man sympathizes with a shake of his head. He heaves a sigh as he says, "Well, as long as you can be here for the rest of the week. We can manage."

Bog groans and tosses down the garlic, vaguely enjoying the sizzle it makes in the oil. "Where are those two bumbling idiots, Stuff an' Thang? They should have been in here by now."

Brutus chuckles and waves a hand. "Bahh, those newbies. Dunno why you hired 'em. They're probably off making a mess somewhere."

"I _hired_ them because I needed extra hands, and brainless idiots who don't ask, jus' follow orders."

"You _could_ fire them."

"I prefer not to go through the hiring process again. I can't stand to see another freshly-turned-twenty-one asshat come in and try to bugger me into a job just so they can drink their shift away," Bog retorts.

Brutus snorts. "That's not why. That's one tiny reason, but truth is, Boss, you have a soft spot for those idiots. You keep 'em around 'cause you feel sorry for 'em, since they're shit workers no one else'd hire. And 'cause they remind you of when you were young 'n' struggling. Am I right?"

Bog reaches over and smacks the back of Brutus' head. "Shut up and keep working, ye big louse!"

But Brutus smiles to himself, because he knows he's right. He hides it and pretends to raise his soapy hands in surrender before returning to his washing.

Bog scoffs and tries to clear his head. He doesn't want to be thinking about uni or his failed attempts at being schooled in the past. He tries, instead, to think of a song. Anything will do. Anything at all…

He finds one, shuts his eyes for the shortest of seconds, and when he opens them, he starts to hum it, and then all he can think about is his work.

James McBoggart refuses to be bogged down by grueling prospect of reentering a college setting at the ripe age of twenty-nine. He's going to hate every second of every day he's stuffed into a classroom with a range of mostly-eighteen-to-early-twenty-year-olds-with-a few-stray-forty-somethings twice a week, but at least he doesn't have to waste the energy hating it before it's begun.

* * *

She revs the bike and feels its thrum under her fingertips, the vibrations of the engine beneath her. A puff of air escapes her lips, not quite visible in the weather yet, but rest assured, by scent alone, she can tell that the cold is on its way. She tucks her brown hair under her helmet, feels the foam brush the fuzz of her undercut, pressure against the industrial piercing just below; a golden arrow with a dangling metal feather in the center of the bar, like the arrow clipped the wing of a bird, but the bird keeps right on soaring.

She tosses her head back and lets out a whoop, revving the engine again and kicking it off its stand. Settling into the mount, she takes off, burning a little rubber and letting off a little smoke as she goes. God, she loves that smell; that oily burn, thick with heat and tar in the air as she takes a year off her wheel in one fell swoop.

The early night is the best time to ride.

She remembers the stigmatism of motorcycles before, the look her father gave her when she saved up and actually followed through on buying her pretty dark purple Yamaha. Sure, it's no Harley or Indian, and sure, it's kind of small, but it suits her just well. It's wicked fast, and gets good gas to the mile, and it's all hers and loves every inch of it.

Her fingers clench through the leather gloves as she makes a turn, taking it a bit fast, maybe a bit wide, but straightening out once she's on the next road.

Where will her bike take her tonight?

The brunette recalls a time when motorcycles frightened her, when she bought into the stigmatism. She hated anything harder than the plush insides of her upper-class home, didn't understand anything beyond getting good grades, winning soccer games, and buying pretty dresses with her sister.

But that life is behind her now.

There were always signs of something more. Even as a child, she would get twigs and brambles in her hair, come home with grass stains on the sparkly jeans her mother helped pick out, and always muddied her shoes. She liked to play rough, even on the field. She always, kicked the furthest and hit the hardest goals. She was never one to be content with only playing jump-rope and sitting on the swing set. She's always competed, and always aimed for more.

But for a while, she might have gotten caught up in the daydreams, in the soft and tender femininity expected of a budding woman.

But the second reality caught up with her…

Her breath hitches. She slows her bike and comes to a red light. The engine chugs idly, her thick black boots tip-toeing to maintain balance. No, she won't dwell on that now. She went for a ride to clear her head, not cloud it with the past.

The light changes, and as soon as the other car is far enough, she blazes ahead. Weaving through traffic perhaps a bit carelessly, her golden-brown eyes narrowed and determined, she takes a right downtown. Neon starts to greet her vision, a line of bars and strip-clubs and joints for dancing and meeting people and offering the temptations of illegal substances. It reeks of dumpsters and the vomit of drunks and the stale city air.

She breathes it in as she parks her bike and removes her helmet, carrying it under one arm while the other hand tosses her hair to shake it as much as possible from its confined helmet shape.

King's Castle is some cheesy Scottish pub in town modeled vaguely after some real castle, but probably features more generally-what-Americans-understand-as-Scottish things, like little carved wooden plaques about Loch Ness and its monster, or varying clan crests over tartan and plaid, whatever the difference is, and little cartoons of ginger-bearded men in kilts with bagpipes. The music they play isn't even Celtic; it's all modern rock and metal and punk, like any other bar that a biker might stumble in to.

It's her favorite place.

She can't come every weekend, she can't afford it, but when she has the money for a wee drink and maybe a bite to eat, she goes. And she chats with the bartender, hits any guy who tries to pick her up, and tips well.

She has friends there, she likes to think. People who understand her. People who get that sure, she doesn't have tattoos, she doesn't pierce more than her ears, and sure, she wears dark makeup on her lids and eyes but doesn't overdo it beyond just that, and yeah, she has a bike, but she isn't a "hardcore biker," and she carries a tiny knife, but not a gun, and that's okay. They get that she has her own way of doing things. They respect that she isn't a poser because she isn't a stereotype, and she doesn't have to be a stereotype to know who her people are. And it's all good.

She saddles up to the bar and sets her helmet down. She smiles warmly at the bartender. The bartender turns to her and grins, greeting her by name.

"Marianne Du Fae. Aren't you a sight for sore eyes! When's the last time you've been here?"

She shrugs. "Maybe a couple of weeks, maybe more. Sorry, had to fix something on my bike, so money was tight for a little while. But I'm back."

"Welcome back!" the 'tender chuckles, setting down a clean glass. She leans one arm against the counter and gestures. "What should I fill it up with, dearie?"

Marianne smiles, slipping off her charcoal denim jacket and placing it along the back of the stool. She strips off her gloves and sticks them into one pocket. Tapping the glass with a fingernail, she answers, "Something thick and heavy and double the dose, because I've missed double the visits," and she laughs. "You know better than I what does the trick, Griselda."

The older woman cackles again and nods knowingly, turning around and mixing a nasty concoction. She turns back, then slides it to Marianne and winks. "I call that one, 'Grissy's Thing For Wild Things.' Careful, it has some bite to it."

Marianne takes a sniff and reels back, grinning, but huffing a, "Whoa-ooh-oh!" and pretending to wave the air above it to banish the smell. "That's wild, all right! Let's see how it tastes."

After a swig, Griselda quirking a brow in curiosity, Marianne takes a breath and sets the glass down, her face turning a tad pink. "So, what's the verdict? Is it too strong for a lass like yourself?"

"Certainly not!" the other replies as if taking on a challenge. "I'll eat it up, I love it so!" And they both laugh before Marianne takes another sip.

"That's my girl. I've missed your spunk! It's been a bore without you, love," Griselda sighs dramatically as she waves a hand and walks down the bar to get someone else's order.

Marianne hums in agreement and takes out her phone while she continues sipping on her monstrous abomination of hard liquor and stout. It's bitter and sweet, thick and strong. Perfect. She can almost make a moustache with the foam, and her throat feels warm all the way down from whatever shots Griselda put into it. She already decides it might be best to order some food to go with this, lest she be on her ass within the hour.

"Oh, Griselda? Could I get an order of your famous fish 'n' chips? This chewy Wild Thing makes me want to bite down on something real."

The graying woman acknowledges her order with a thumbs up. "On the way, dearie!"

The brunette settle into her bar stool and places her chin in her palm. On an empty stomach with half her drink downed, she can already feel the oncoming haze just creeping around the corners of her brain. She closes her eyes, feels the weight of the eyeshadow and eyeliner, the feather-softness of lashes without mascara. She sighs through her nose contentedly.

Finally, she can forget for a while, and simply _be._

* * *

 _A/N: Here I am? Back to writing fanfic again? Because of a stupid fairy movie with a really fucking cute ship? And I don't know what's going on, somebody stop me. or encourage me. Whichever will work out best, considering the fact that I started this and have full-time work and full-time classes to attend to, askjsadfshd_


	2. Two: Class Routine

Slinging her bag over her shoulder, Marianne looks down at her class schedule again. Her first class starts at eight, and it was only available as a morning class, and only worked with her other classes as the earliest of its times, and man, she is _not_ a morning person. Maybe she was when she was a kid, but good Lord, middle school changes things. And she has yet to purchase her books, because she's been procrastinating. But whatever, they usually go over the syllabus on the first day, so she has some time. Still…

School. It never ends. Why the fuck is she twenty-two and still earning her AA? Where did the time go? This is _ridiculous._ And why? Why does _literally_ every job that pays what's needed to _survive_ require a degree? She sure as hell can't be trapped in Retail Hell for the rest of her life, no fucking way.

It's bad enough she's stuck where she is, even though it _is_ one of the few places that lets her have her piercings and keep the purple streaks in her hair. But still. It's the principle of it all; dealing with idiot teenagers who come in and are loud and obnoxious with their laughter and pranks and possible theft and outright impolite behavior, disregarding and disrespecting not only the employees but the other customers as well. Fuck the privileged assholes, too, who storm into the store and act like they deserve to be treated special or like royalty just because they have the fucking benefits card the store offers. Fuck them all. Fuck retail, man.

But hey, it was this or fast food. And Marianne doesn't want to smell like burgers and fries all week, either. So stocking shelves and answering questions it is.

It pays the rent and utilities, and with her sister and their childhood friend helping pay for the same, they even have enough together for groceries and the occasional furniture item. But with one car between them, they all got a job at the same store so they can carpool. It works out okay in the end, and while her sister Dawn is going to beauty school to become a stylist, at least Marianne has good old Anthony "Sunny" Rogers with her at the community college nearby.

"Ready to go?" she struggles to call out to Sunny from the apartment door. "Hurry up, Sunny, or I'm leaving without you!"

"Coming, coming!" the other replies from his room, and Marianne hears something fall and Sunny stop in his tracks to turn around and fix it.

She rolls her eyes and smiles amusedly, shutting the door again. She turns, leaning her weight onto one foot and placing her free hand on her hip, the other secured around her backpack strap. "You klutz. What'd you break now?"

"Nothing's broken," Sunny grumbles as he comes rushing out of his room, shrugging his own yellow and black pack onto both shoulders. "One of my Pop figures fell, that's all."

She chuckles and opens the door again for them both, saying on the way out, "You nerd. How many of those things do you even have?"

"Forty-three and counting," he answers with a mix of pride and shame in his tone. He sighs, running a hand over his untamable hair, then scratching his freckled cheek. "I guess that… might be a bit nerdy, huh?"

"Just a bit," Marianne agrees with a kind smile as they make their way down the stairs toward the entrance. "But they are pretty cute, I guess. I just would never spend my money on that kind of stuff."

"That's part of the fun of it," Sunny remarks, "You don't need them, they're just nice to have to show what I'm in to and, I dunno, maybe be an investment in the future."

They reach Marianne's old Nissan and pile in. She lets the poor thing warm up for a minute while she picks out a CD to pop into the player.

"Can I ever put one of my CDs in? I get tired of your same old, same old all the time," Sunny sighs. "You could really use some more upbeat beats, Mari."

"My beats are just the right beat for me," she replies. "Besides, don't you know the rules? Driver picks the music, and –"

"Passenger shuts his cake hole. I know, I know," Sunny concedes. He smiles. "I hate when you use classic Supernatural against me."

"Hey, I know when to speak your language," the brunette shrugs. "Now let's hit the road before my first cup of coffee wears off."

* * *

Bog clicks his tongue in distaste at the list in his hands. Because he's cramming it onto two days, his classes start at eight in the friggin' morning and the last of them don't end until five in the evening. Sure, he has quite a gap in the middle of the day for a nice two-hour lunch period, but that's it. It's just enough to grab a bite, maybe take a power nap or do a tiny bit of reading/note taking/homework, but not much else.

Sighing heavily, Bog pinches between his eyes and rubs down his sockets with his thumb and forefinger, forcing himself to stand. He runs a hand over his dark hair, then down his ginger stubble. He never understood Scotsman genetics, giving a man dark brown or black hair, then a speckling of ginger on his chin. He rubs at the point of his jaw, feeling the grit like prickly sandpaper, and makes a little grunt at his reflection. Turning away before he wonders if the scars on his jaw and the ones that sever his left brow have somehow deepened instead of faded, he picks up an old, beaten messenger bag that used to belong to his father and hoists it up onto his broad, bony shoulder.

Time to get this over with. The sooner, the better.

…At least one of his classes, an extracurricular, is Drawing 101. A blow-off class, maybe. Just show up, put something on paper, and the professor is satisfied. At least not everything will strain his brain, and he's grateful for it. There is only so much he can handle from the rest of his classes, nearly all survey classes that try to shove information down his throat at record speeds.

The bar chef grabs his bulky, ancient iPod off his dresser and slips his clunky headphones over his ears, careful to adjust the black electrical tape around the plug to keep the music static-free and in both ears.

Then he's out the door, giving his fluffy black cat a quick pet from head to tail on the way out of his humble studio apartment.

* * *

"Catch ya later, Mari!" Sunny waves as he heads toward his first class, in a separate building from Marianne's. She waves and smiles back, then takes a deep, refreshing breath as she heads toward her own classroom.

It's only on Tuesdays and Thursdays and any evenings she isn't stuck closing at work that Marianne can feel like herself, in her own clothes and style, and not in hideous khakis and polos. She takes another deep breath, closer to a sigh, and marches onward.

Room 2130, room 2130… Second floor…

Where is it, where is it… It's down this hall somewhere, the directional plaques _said_ so, it said rooms 2110-2144, but God, this hallways goes on _forever…_

"Aha!" the brunette accidentally says aloud when she finds the right door and yanks it open. A couple people turn toward the noise of her entering, the rest look like they're still asleep in bed and haven't realized they've been transported to a classroom.

She chooses a spot near the front – it's some of the only spaces left available, because it seems no one wants to be noticed – and sets her stuff on the floor. She takes out a notebook, but mostly to doodle. She's doesn't have a tattoo yet, but she's considering one. Just one, something artsy and symbolic, maybe, and preferably something she's drawn herself. Tattoo artists can be incredible artists, but she prefers something of her own on her body. Maybe out of pride, maybe for independence, maybe to make sure it's unique.

Maybe all three reasons.

The professor comes into the room, a slow and wide, graying old man with liver spots and a honking big nose, glasses thicker than beer bottles and slipping down his face. He shoves them up and clears his throat, and shockingly, his voice is strong and youthful, more with a slight rasp of sleep than a rasp of age. He introduces himself, pulls down the screen, and gets the computer up and running to show them all how the school website works, informs them all homework will be turned in online, and then continues to bring the syllabus up to go through it.

Marianne tunes out after his name.

She doodles a primrose being sipped at by a butterfly, but the butterfly's wings are a bit torn on one side, and half an antennae is missing. This butterfly has been through a lot, she thinks, but it stays strong and carries on its usual life, because that's all one _can_ do.

The professor opens the table for questions, talks a bit more about himself, like where he got his degrees and what his job was before teaching, and about his dogs, and his life partner.

Well, Marianne thinks, she wasn't expecting that. Somewhere down the line she mistakenly assumed most old folk were homophobic or at least too ashamed to admit themselves, but no, this man gives his spouse's name and tells a little about the other man's job and everything. It's sweet, seeing the sudden softness and warmth reach this professor's eyes when he talks about him, and Marianne relaxes. She had been prepared to just tolerate this professor like any other and move on, but somehow, this display changes her mind. She's keener on learning the subject, now, just from learning something different about the person teaching it.

Class is dismissed, and Marianne heads out with a faint smile at the corners of her lips. She feels ready for her next class, more curious than she was when she woke up this morning. What other qualities does this school possess?

* * *

Tall, broad-shouldered but skinny-waisted, all long legs and long arms with a long torso, knees and elbows amidst muscle, firm stomach without defined abs, but biceps that prove his strength.

Bog wonders if anyone notices, or if all they see is the height and gloomy overcast of his frowned brows and tin, tight lips.

He nibbles the skin behind his lips, chewing the insides of his mouth sometimes until it bleeds. They see a scowl; he's really twisting his mouth to tear away pieces of anxiety.

He hates crowds.

His bar he can handle; most everyone is in their own little packs to celebrate or chill, or are by themselves to drink their misery away. It's manageable. But here… eugh, he almost forgot how people bustle about in school hallways, and linger outside closed doors until the professor lets them in, or another class ends.

So far, his first couple classes have been nothing but the syllabus, seeing what the semester schedule is going to look like, and learning how many exams and papers are going to be involved. He can't even remember any of his professor's names; he'll have to look at his schedule or the syllabus later as a cheat-sheet, though he hopes he never has to address them by name. He's just here to get grades good enough to pass, not make acquaintances he'll lose once the semester is over.

It's time for that two-hour break, though, and he's glad of it. It'll be crowded with last-minutes like himself, but at least he can use this time to slip down to the bookstore and get his books. All used, and all being put on his student loan. He needs to get a couple supplies, too; notebooks, pencils. He had nothing but a couple old folders and a pen this morning. Now, at least, he might be able to get what he really needs; especially the art supplies for his drawing class.

The bookstore is less crowded than he thought it might be, but there are still lines everywhere. Lines to pay, lines to check the two lone computers up here for their book lists.

Bog, for once, appreciates his six feet and five inches, because it's like being Moses' staff when parting the Red Sea. Everyone makes room for him, sensing his presence and peering over their shoulder just in time to skitter to the side, or seeing him coming head-on and bolting aside.

Going down the alphabetical list, Bog fills his complimentary reusable bag with the school's logo on it with all his textbooks, then heads across the floorpad to the other supplies. He drops in two three-subject notebooks, a pack of pencils and erasers, and then yanks out the art supply list. God, does he really need some huge-ass portfolio with a massive eighteen-by-twenty-four inch sketchbook? Note to mention all these charcoals and H and B pencils… _Jesus._ What even is a blending stick? Is it really necessary when graphite smudges well all by itself?

Grunting, Bog skims the aisles and drops more supplies into his now heavy bag. He isn't paying attention, and knocks over some portfolios with his knee. "Fuck."

Immediately when he utters the curse, on the other side of the aisle, a girl yelps when a whole stack of canvases fall to the ground, thunking edges one after the other.

Bog peers over the shelves and finds a pixie-undercut brunette with fading purple streaks in her hair stooping to pick them all up. He peers down at his own mess, quickly sets the portfolios upright, and then starts to go help the girl, stopping short for a moment.

Sure, his mother raised him to be polite and somewhat chivalrous, and he's helped plenty of women at the bar when they've spilled their purses or fallen over from too much to drink, or helped watch them to make sure they went into a cab and not into a stranger's vehicle. He's saved one woman in particular from someone yanking and wrapping their arms around her, trying to tug her away from the bar while she weakly and drunkly protested "No, I just wanna go home," and of course, like clockwork, every girl he's assisted his mother asked, "Did you get her number? Do you like her? Do you think you'll see her again? Did you catch her name?" and every time, he insists, no, he didn't, because not every single person he meets is a potential love interest, and he's just trying to do the right thing, not be yet another scumbag trying to get into a woman's pants.

And so he halts a second, because it's as though he's been conditioned to help, but resents helping every time because he gets berated for it.

So he shoves his hands in his pockets and is about to leave when the woman looks up, sees him lingering, and snaps, "What're you lookin' at? Am in in your way or something? You can wait a fuckin' minute."

Defensive, Bog curls up his lip and retorts, "Actually, I was about to _help_ you, but clearly you and your shite attitude got it covered. I'm sure it goes quickly, between the two of you." And he makes to pick his things back up and leave her there.

But she's having none of that.

She makes a small growl and slams down some of the canvases in her hands. "Then you can do it! I've had enough of this _shite_ for one morning." And she mocks his accent, and nothing pisses him off more than when an American makes a remark like, 'What are you, British?' or 'Are you faking that?' or simply starts rattling off British terms in a horrendous attempt at the accent to mock him.

"Your morning can't have been any rougher than mine, _tough girl._ And pick up your own damn mess! What do I look like, a janitor?"

"You wanna bet my morning wasn't worse?" she challenges, then scoffs as she crouches down to return to picking up her mess. "I can top any tragedy you've had today."

"Like I give a bleedin' crap about how some girl's morning went," he counters, though he sees her frustration is compromising her basic motor functions, and she's on the brink of tears. She huffs and struggles with the canvases that are a bit too large for her arms, one tumbling off the pile when she goes to put them back into their wire frame holder.

Bog sighs and rolls his eyes, bending over to pick up the fallen canvas and slot it into place. The girl sniffs, "Thanks," quietly, and seems determined not to shed a tear and ruin her eyeshadow so dark someone might think she had a black eye.

"It's nothing." He goes to leave, then fights with himself. He can't just leave her there like that, it's too pathetic. "Look," he says, turning back to pick up the remaining two canvases while the brunette stands there, her fists clenched, seemingly frozen. "It's none of my business, but, uh… are you taking Drawing 101, too?"

She almost smiles. "Yeah. Last class of the day for you?"

"Yeah."

"Me too," she sighs, dabbing at one eye and straightening herself. "Sorry, didn't mean to blow up at a stranger. Or, um… make fun of your accent."

"It's fine," he shrugs, regrettably adding, "I'm used to it."

This time, she does smile. "And I'm used to being called tough. Guess we're square." She gives a little shrug.

He raises a brow and considers her a moment. "So, tell me… what _did_ get your knickers in a twist today?"

Her responding sigh is long and heavy and thick, almost tangible. She puts her face in her hands. "My loans didn't go through in time before I applied them late and forgot to use a deferment." She pulls her face from her fingers and sighs again, curtly this time. "My first class didn't take attendance," she gestures with one hand, then slams another down mid-air, "But my second one _did_ , and… she didn't call my name."

"Oh…" Bog empathizes; this happened to him years ago when he was first attending college, and that's why he made sure to do it right this time. He knows what she's feeling right now all too well.

She continues, "I lost everything I registered for, and had to go down to the guidance office and register all _over_ again. And I had to pick whatever was open, and so some of my classes are just for the credit and not because I even _like_ any of them, except… Drawing. That's the one thing I was able to get back because it was still open."

Bog smiles a little. "That's the one class I had any real say in, either. You draw?"

"Kind of," she says, insecure about it. "Doodles, mostly. I'm designing a tattoo for myself, and I dunno if that's something I'll do as a career, maybe I'll do something else, but it's something. I actually think it'd be cooler to be, like, an art therapist or something," she says, and they begin to move; she collects the rest of her supplies, and Bog grabs his own things, following alongside her while she talks to him. Somehow, he doesn't mind. It looks like she needs an open ear right now.

"Not a bad decision, either way. I have a few tats meself. I'm not here to get a degree in art or anything, though. I just wanted one extracurricular that was…"

"Easy?" she supplies, and he shrugs and nods, because, yeah. Pretty much.

"But not just that. Also one that I could do something with my hands," he adds, holding up his long-digits with oil under his nails. "I'm too used to doing things with my hands to sit patiently in a classroom all day."

She smiles and stifles a laugh.

"What?" he snarls, smile falling. He doesn't like being made fun of.

"Nothing," she says to herself more than to him. She shakes her head and heads over to the textbooks, looking at her freshly printed list. "Well, I have some books to look for. And you have some to pay for," she says, nodding to his full bag. She looks way up at him. God, she's small. She can't be taller than maybe five feet, three inches or so. She just comes up to his diaphragm, if that. Her eyelevel is just above his navel. "I'll see you around, I guess?"

He nods, and doesn't say anything by way of goodbye. He simply heads the opposite direction, headed for the registers.

As he leaves, Bog frowns a little and wonder what that whole exchange was. It's not exactly a one-time deal, 'cause she shares a class with him, he knows. But maybe it was just a one-time, because no way a girl like her would talk to him again, he's sure of it. Even "see you around" has a vaguer connotation than "see you later" might.

He shirks the feeling and moves on, focused on just paying and getting the hell out of the bookstore so he can get something to eat. His metabolism is screaming at him for nourishment.

Back in the bookstore, Marianne takes on a puzzled smile. She likes the way that stranger says "day" like "dae". And she likes that he looks like a kindred spirit, someone who'd understand her lifestyle. And maybe herself, too.

* * *

 _A/N: Not quite how I intended their first meeting to go - I wanted a bookstore scene with someone so upset they get clumsy and the other so careless they get clumsy, but then they wound up talking more than I meant to, but... I guess it's okay? haha,, we'll see how it goes._


	3. Three: The Name Game

He knew it. He absolutely knew it.

Throughout the entire period, the girl from the bookstore doesn't once acknowledge him. Doesn't says a word, hardly looks his way. She looks at the professor, she doodles, she does the warm-up exercises once he's done explaining the syllabus, because this is a four-credit-hour class that meets twice a week for two hours each, and has loads of time to kill. So she kills that time without acting like she didn't just meet Bog a couple hours ago.

Whatever. He hates being right.

He can't wait for this school day to end. He has a job to get to.

* * *

He's here. She knew he would be, he said so, but some part of her wished he weren't, that there was a miscommunication, that there are multiple drawing courses at the end of the day at different times and they never said a time, so they actually meant a different class.

But no, he's here, and he's _glaring_ at her.

And Marianne's embarrassed.

Embarrassed because she never tells anyone her problems. She hardly shares things with her sister unless it's absolutely called for, because Marianne likes to keep her guard up. She doesn't trust people, because most people don't give her any reason to trust.

And she can't believe those passing thoughts she had when he left the bookstore; _him_ a kindred spirit? _Him_ possibly understanding her? Where did that rubbish even come from? Just because he dresses a bit like her – like he owns a bike, maybe, what with the leather jacket and fingerless leather gloves, those scars on his face, the steel-toed boots over ragged, tastefully dirty jeans – doesn't mean he is actually like her at all. Sure, he got just as feisty with her as she did him, for a moment, but that doesn't say much, either. What came over her in that brief moment? Why did she talk to him at all? And why didn't he leave when he intended to?

Shaking her head, Marianne tries her best to focus, and not look in his direction, especially not to meet that glare. So she does her work and leaves, one of the first out the door. This is too awkward. She's going home.

* * *

"James, love, how was your first day of class?" his mother croons from the receiver, and he sighs as he shrugs off his bag and sets his helmet down. He takes out a toothpick from the old tobacco tin in his pocket and plants it between his teeth.

"Fine, Mum, just fine." He sifts through his mail. Junk, junk, credit card bill, motorcycle magazine, political junk. He tosses half of it in the trash, right as his cat leaps up onto the counter for attention and treats.

"Meet any cute girls?" she asks straight away, but doesn't give him time to answer. She carries on, "Ooh, there is just the sweetest regular at the bar I wish you could meet. I tried my new drink on her, you know, the Wild Thing one? She guzzled the whole thing! There's a drink that'll put hair on your chest, and she takes it like it's nothing. I like her. I think you would, too! But if there's someone else you have your eye on…"

He rolls his striking blue eyes and groans. "Uhhhg, Muuum! We've been other this –"

"I know, I know. I shouldn't pressure you. But you're nearly thirty, and with no one by your side! That alone just breaks my poor old heart. The last one you dated was just after high school, nearly a decade ago… and I just want you to be happy, Jimmy. Why won't you let anyone in? And I already told you, if you fancy boys instead, I wouldn't –"

"MUM!" Bog barks into his cell phone, irritated. "I have homework to do before work. I'll see you at the Castle. Good _bye."_ And he hangs up while she rushes to say "Iloveyou!" before the hang-up is complete. She knows him too well, and her timing is getting better and better. She almost got the full three syllables in there.

Bog plops down onto his sofa, his cat hopping from the counter and coming to pool into his lap. He pets him idly, scratching under his chin while he stares off into space, eyes vaguely tracing the texture on the ceiling.

"Uuuuhhg… My mother, Bones. I love her, but some days I want to remove her vocal chords."

The cat purrs in response. Bog peers down at the cat's pumpkin eyes with those blown vertical pupils and can't help but smile.

"Well, at least _you_ don't care if I'm single or not." And neither should I, he adds mentally, but shakes the thought away. Because he does care. God, he cares every goddamn day, and he just can't stand hearing the reminder aloud from his mother every chance she gets.

But he's faced the truth a long time ago: no one wants this ugly mug around, and if it isn't his mug, it's his ugly personality. And he knows it. So he has his cat and his bar, and for now, he convinces himself that that's all he needs.

* * *

"So, how was your first day?" Dawn drops her weight down onto Marianne's bed, successfully jostling her older sister.

The brunette smiles at the blonde, then slowly lets her face fall while she sighs through her nose. "I don't know… both terrible and okay? I found out that I had to reregister for everything because my loans didn't go through in time, so I could only get back one of the four classes I initially signed up for."

"What!" Dawn exclaims as she stands up again, hands up in the air. "They can't do that to you! You –"

"Did it a tad too late, and forgot to defer it, so when it was done processing, it was too late for the deadline to pay," Marianne finishes correctly. She pats the bed for Dawn to sit back down. The blonde does, but with a pout. "It's my fault."

"Still, they should have a rule or something to help make sure that doesn't happen. I'm so sorry, Marianne."

She shrugs. "It's okay. I fixed it as best I could, got the new books – man, am I glad I didn't pay for the other ones already – and went to the correct classes for the rest of the day. So it's fine." A pause. Then, "How was your day?"

Dawn perks up right away, kicking her feet where they don't quite touch the ground. "Amazing! There's this guy who wants to do monster movie makeup, and he's super cool and was so nice to me, and his name is Nathan and don't worry, I checked – he's _not_ gay! I know I keep meeting the guys who are –"

"Maybe because you go to _beauty_ school?" Marianne smirks, raising a brow.

"C'mon, don't stereotype like that! You know I hate it when you get that way," Dawn frowns.

"I promise I'll behave, Miss SJW." And she gives her sister a little nudge.

"Shut up, Feminazi," Dawn laughs, giving her a small shove back. "Anyway… I really like my teachers this semester, and my portfolio is coming along."

"Mmm, I know. I'm featured in most of it," Marianne nods as she reaches for a textbook and flips it open, preparing to get some of her homework out of the way, maybe get ahead of the syllabus schedule before she falls behind like usual.

"Haha, yeah… thanks again for letting me try an undercut on you. And give you a bob and then a pixie before that… And the streaks… Which, by the way, we need to freshen up soon. How about red this time? Or dark blue?"

Marianne flips a page and shakes her head, grinning widely. "Whatever you want. And which color palette are you learning for makeup right now?"

"Mm, that one's neutrals. Which is more my style than yours, so I'll test those out myself. I'll get you next time, though!"

"I can't wait," Marianne chuckles, and decides just to read the vocabulary and chapter summary at the end instead of the whole chapter. It's good enough.

"Well, I'll leave you to your work, I guess! Maybe I can go bother Sunny, see how his day was."

"Oh, I'm sure he'll tell you all about it, like he did to me at lunch, once I was done reregistering and getting my books," she snorts.

"Ooh, sounds juicy!" Dawn bounds up and skips off toward Sunny's room, and Marianne follows suit just far enough to shut her bedroom door after Dawn.

With a yawn, Marianne shoves her books aside and sprawls out on her bed. She closes her eyes for a second, promising it won't be for long.

She starts to drift off, and for some reason, all she can see in her mind's eye are a pair of bright blue eyes, distinctively not her sister's.

* * *

The following day is work. Work, work, work.

Marianne dons her khaki and polo, clips on her magnetic nametag, and hops on her motorcycle. Any day that it's nice enough to ride it, she does, so that Sunny can use the car. She feels bad when poor Dawn has to take the bus to school on days Marianne and Sunny have to use the car for their own classes, and she doesn't trust Dawn with the car, not since she's bumped other vehicles in the parking lot… thrice. And three strikes means she's out.

Dawn and Sunny work today, too, but they did in the morning. Marianne has a closing shift today, so they have the car already there, and will be leaving soon, maybe about an hour after Marianne needs to be there. So the brunette makes her way there, and prays that it's a slow night so she can just get her zoning done and leave.

Marianne is called up to backup at the checkout lanes five times; she keeps count carefully.

On the third time, she passes by a customer who seems familiar, but is in too much of a hurry to think who or where she'd know them from.

On her fifth time backing up, right before she's about to get off, someone comes into her lane. And okay, fine, she can take one more customer, whatever.

The customer stops, stares at her.

She makes eye contact in return.

It's the guy from the bookstore.

He's so tall, how didn't she recognize him immediately an hour ago? And here he is, and he looks like he's torn between finding another lane to checkout, or just dealing with it because all the other lanes will have a much longer wait.

Marianne actually spots the moment he must be thinking, "fuck it," because he hesitates, then his shoulders relax a bit and he marches onward. He's only buying a basket's worth of things: a two-pack of paper towels, a box of wet cat food, and three bottles of liquor.

Whoa, okay. _Somebody_ 's either having a party, or is an alcoholic. She prays not the latter.

"Hello. Find everything okay?" she says automatically as she starts scanning the items, trying to keep her eyes on the products and not up at him. The scotch is the first of the alcohol she scans, which she mentally notes is probably the most obvious and stereotypical thing a guy with a Scottish accent could buy, and she bites back a smile. The prompt comes up on the screen for his license. "Um, may I see some ID?"

He whips it out to her, already prepared, and she fumbles to take it, because she has to look up. He's positively neutral, no expression on his face. She drops the card, it flopping with a soft plastic click on the scanner. She picks it up, turns to type in his birthday.

His name is James McBoggart, she notes, feeling creepy for purposely looking at his name. She's never purposely looked at the name on someone's license before. Usually, she picks up the scanner gun and scans the barcode on the back of the ID, but she's curious. Questionably curious about who this guy is. His birthday is in January, an icy month to match his icy stare, and if her math is right, he's turning thirty soon. He's about eight years older than her. He sort of looks it, gruff as he is, but he also doesn't look it at all.

Marianne hands his license back, scans the other two bottles, puts them all in bags. Reads out his total while he flips out his wallet to pay in cash.

The second he looks down, she can't stop staring at him. His cheekbones are high and protrude out more than most people's; his jawline is long and narrow, littered with stubble and scars at his chin, coming down from his lip; his thick, dark eyebrows are split with a scar on one side, and his ears are ever so slightly pointed from where they peek out from his brushed back hair.

She thinks he's handsome, now that she has a good look at him. He's almost scary, almost unattractive. He rides that border of rugged that some actors do, where they are equal parts interesting to look at and not someone one expects people to want to look at. She could draw that face over and over and never get it right, but would desperately keep trying to.

She takes his money, gives him his change; she's very, very careful not to touch his hands, only the currency. She looks at his hands instead. He looks like he could play guitar, or piano, with those long fingers and thick, cropped nails of his.

Marianne puts the money in the register, feels his impatient gaze. He's already grabbing his bags as he waits on her. She snaps up the receipt the second it's done printing, and hands it to him.

"Have a good day," she says, robotic and automatic, and then his face gives way to emotion.

It's a smug, sly grin. "You, too, _Marianne."_ And then he's gone, already walking away.

She blinks, about to question how he knows her name –

Her nametag. _Duh._ She feels like an idiot, and smacks her own forehead to confirm the feeling.

…Well… at least they both know each other's names, now. And can put a name to the face that keeps showing up.


	4. Four: In Glimpses

Bog lets the bottles bump into one another with a soft _clink, clank_ as he drops off the liquor he bought for his mother's top shelf selection at the bar.

"There. Any other errands for me to run?" he grumbles, about to head for the kitchen. "I got a weird look from the cashier, you know, for buying three goddamn bottles of the hard stuff."

"Ah, people will think what they want to think. You know the truth," Griselda shrugs, taking the scotch, brandy, and bourbon and putting them into their rightful slots on her shelf, their sister bottles nearly empty in front of them. "There! Thank you, love. It looks nice and lush now." She dusts off an older bottle with a rag, and then snaps the clotch at her son. "And _you_! Where are you running off to? We have another cook in tonight. Why don't you stay out here with your old Mumsie and help me 'tend?" she pleads, putting her hands together off to the side of her mouth.

Bog scowls. "I'd rather not. I've had quite the day."

The older woman sighs as he slips back into the kitchen.

"I don't know why he does that," she says more to herself than to the couple people seated near her at the bar. "If he just showed his face more, he might be better off."

* * *

Marianne takes her usual stool at the bar, dropping her stuff down before folding her arms on the vaguely sticky polished wood surface, pressing her cheek to her forearm and sighing deeply.

"Aw, poor lass. What's got you down?" Griselda chimes in greeting. Marianne is relieved that Griselda is bartending tonight; she's Marianne's favorite. Some of the other bartenders are sloppy and inexperienced, but Griselda is a master. A queen of the Castle.

"I'm one week in to classes, starting my second, and I have to go back tomorrow and I don't _wanna,_ " she groans, with less whining and more dreading.

"Aw. I'm sorry to hear it. My son is just heading back to school himself, after years without a degree. Can't get anywhere in this country without one; feels like back home you can get by owning a bar without a degree, but here, people try to take your bar from under your nose!" the older woman vents heatedly, and Marianne sits up to listen.

"Are people really trying to take your bar from you?" she says, angry. "Fuck them! They can fuck right off. This place is great, I wouldn't want it to change management. Part of its charm is the real Scottish woman running it!"

"Damn right!" Griselda punctuates with a flick of a rag. She wipes a spill on the counter and then slings the cloth over her shoulder to rest. She sighs. "And my poor, poor baby boy… His father gave him the place, you know. Deed and all. He wanted to make a name and some money for himself here in America, and dragged us all with 'im. And I'm glad, because it's sunnier here and the people are less of grouches because of it." She winks, and Marianne laughs appropriately. "Anyway, listen to me going on and on. What'll ye have, dearie?"

The brunette thinks for a moment, then shrugs. "I dunno. I shouldn't get drunk before a morning class, and tonight, I kind of didn't come here to drink, I just wanted some fresh air, some familiar faces, and a sweet, kooky old bat to chat with."

Griselda tips her head back and lets out a loud wheeze of a chuckle, her chin tucking back in to her collarbones for a snicker to follow. She raises her head and wipes some moisture from one eye. "Aye, sometimes that's all ya need! Oh, you're always going to be one of my favorite regulars, dear. How about some soda, on the house? That way you stay sober and I have an excuse to keep you around." She winks again.

Marianne brightens. "Deal."

* * *

With an extra cook, Bog seems to be about the only person to bring the food out front. So, fine, he can do that much.

He has an order of chili fries and another of their popular home-roasted salt and pepper peanuts he's bringing out for a couple of fellas at one of the tables, and at first, he's too keen on maintaining balance as he picks up their drinks his mother's prepared along the way to really take notice of his surroundings. He makes a beeline for the table, forces a fake smile, sets down the grub and drinks, and turns to retreat back to the kitchen.

And then he notices her.

The light is dim and vague, but the closer he gets, the more sure he is that it's her. Same haircut, same hourglass build, but she's in a leather jacket and there's a bike helmet beside her. She rides, too? He somehow isn't surprised, as if he just got a confirmation of something common sense.

He slows his pace and frowns deeply as he edges around the bar counter, headed for the kitchen doors. She's smiling and nodding here and there, talking to his mother while his mother refills the girl's glass with something from the fountain.

He shakes his head and ducks into the kitchen again.

Is no place safe from this woman's presence?

* * *

"Oh, that was him! Son-!" Griselda turns, but he's already retreated behind the metal doors. "Bahh," she waves a hand in his direction, dismissing him, and turning back to Marianne. "See? What'd I tell you? He's stubborn as an ox not to interact. I don't know why I bother."

The brunette shrugs, smiles. "Honestly, I don't blame him! If I could have my way, I would shove everyone I don't know or care about to the other side of the globe, and be happily alone with only the spare few people I find are good company. Interacting with the public is overrated and most of the time unnecessary."

Griselda sighs and shakes her head. "I'm not so sure that's it. My boy… his trust issues run rather deep. I keep asking him to maybe check into counseling, because I worry he might have some kind of anxiety, probably of the social sort, or depression, at least. He was certainly depressed in high school. He hardly ate, he would either sleep too much or not a wink, and he had this expression on his face, love… I'll never forget it, it still haunts me to the day. This look of, of…"

"…Emptiness," Marianne murmurs, barely heard over the music, but Griselda catches it and nods.

"Like the dead walking, exactly. Like there was nothing to feel, nothing to look forward to. It took me ages to get him out of that funk, and this was before his father passed, you know."

"Oh," Marianne looks at Griselda with concern and empathy. "Your husband…?"

"Liver failure," she sighs. "He loved this bar, and he loved his liquor even more. Sober as I stand before you, he would be long drunk by now and still making drinks like a professional. He drank his life away, and he was sometimes a bit rough with us. But I loved him so."

"I'm so sorry," Marianne replies. She isn't sure what to say. Since she could legally drink, she always came to this place. She's had her eye on coming in here since she was eighteen. She always loved the charming aesthetic of it, and since she met Griselda and started talking to her, she hasn't bothered to go anywhere else. Griselda remembers her and her usual orders and will talk to her without judgement. She's like a second mother, but friendlier.

"It's all right." The middle-aged woman sniffs sadly, sighs. She picks up an empty glass someone left and idly sets it aside to be taken and washed. "I just don't know what to do. He's a grown man, I've already raised him. How much mothering am I allowed now?"

Marianne smiles delicately, in warm consolation. "Hey, it's okay. You never really stop being a mother, and you can do as much mothering as you need to do to knock some sense into someone." She pauses, then adds more softly, "Feel free to mother me any time you can't mother him. I haven't had a mother since I was ten."

Griselda looks at her then, really looks at her, and suddenly reaches over the counter and embraces the young woman, and Marianne awkwardly pats Griselda's back as she's nearly suffocated in the woman's apron over her breast. "You poor thing! I had no idea! I'm so sorry, so sorry. No little girl deserves to grow into a woman without a mother around! You poor, poor thing…"

"I'm, uh, I-I'm okay, Grissy, really…" Marianne tries to say, coming out muffled. "I'm a… a tough girl," she says, and frowns a little. Where has she heard that before? Recently? At the moment, she can't quite recall.

"Oh, sweetie, you certainly are. A good, strong girl," the bartender replies, finally pulling away and dabbing at her eyes. Her mascara has run and with her winkles and wide face, she looks a big haggard. "Now! Why can't my boy have a girl like you in his life? Someone like you'd keep all his pieces together."

Marianne laughs suddenly, shaking her head. "Hey, don't try to set me up, kooky old bat. I made a vow that I would choose my men from now on, because the last time I let myself get set up, only trouble became of it. So from now on, if I see a guy who I _don't_ want to punch in the face the second he speaks to me, then I'm open to giving him a shot. But 'til then…" and she slams one fist into her other palm, grinning fiercely.

"A good motto," Griselda barks a laugh, then glances at the old grandfather clock the bar has by its door. "Shouldn't you be running off soon, girlie? It's almost midnight. You'll turn back into a pumpkin and won't be able to make it to class tomorrow."

"Oh, the woes of having to miss class," Marianne exaggerates with a melodramatic voice and a fake swoon. "Whatever shall I do?"

The bartender shoos her away. "Do well and go to class and graduate, ye nincompoop!"

"Haha, alright, alright. I'm going, I'm going." The brunette chugs the remainder of her glass, ending with a satisfied, "Ahh," and then slams it down. She salutes the older woman as she grabs her helmet and slides it on. "Au revoir, mademoiselle."

"Goodbye to you, too, kid. Stay safe out there."

* * *

While unlocking her bike and straddling it to turn the ignition, someone comes out of the side door of the bar to take out a bag of trash. He's tall and broad-shouldered, and silhouetted in the distance orange light of the nearest streetlamp. Marianne squints through her helmet. She revs her bike, starts to creep in reverse from her parking spot to get a better look.

He doesn't see her, but she sees him. Not well, but the shadows cast on the angles of his face are unmistakable. She knows its him, and a cold stone plummets in her gut. Could he be…? No, he couldn't. Maybe he just works here as a coincidence? And… and maybe her eyes are playing tricks on her. It is really dark out, and her brain could be filling in the blanks to make someone resemble someone else but isn't actually that person…

Marianne shakes her head, turns her bike, and rides out and away from the King's Castle.

It was only a glimpse, and not a clear one. She's just tired, and thinking of tomorrow already.

It's not him.

She moves on.

* * *

A week goes by. There's class, there's work, and that McBoggart guy hasn't been showing up to Drawing 101. Marianne is still here, and is starting to wonder if that guy dropped the class. And she wonders if he did it because of her.

"Sunny, do you realize you've only been talking about my sister for the past half hour?" Marianne inquires as she sits down with her lunch tray in hand, a mushroom swiss burger with fries and a tall Mountain Dew. "Seriously. You need to own up to it, man. You're in love with her. And as a protective elder sibling, I am sorely tempted to kick you out of the goddamn apartment because I won't have you creepin' on her."

"Marianne!" Sunny exclaims, his dark cheeks tinting darker with a blush. "Th-that's not – I would never – C-c'mon! I've been your guys' friend since second grade! You know me, I'm not like that –"

She flicks a fry at his face, gets him in the nose. A couple grains of salt cling to the tip, and she wipes at his nose furiously before glaring at her. She smiles. "I was only teasing, shortstack. You know I love you, you're like a brother to me. And for the love of God, I'm dying for you to _tell_ Dawn already, so that I can A), keep her away from the fuckboys she keeps attracting, and B), be both your Best Man and her Maid of Honor at the wedding. 'Cause you know I could totally rock being both. How do you want your roaring stag party to be themed? Star Wars or Star Trek?"

Sunny groans and plants his face in his arms, muttering an "ow" when his forehead hits the table instead. "Star Trek," he answers.

Marianne snickers and shoves a fry into her mouth, chewing with a smile. "Knew it. What a nerd."

She turns and looks nowhere in particular as she reaches for her burger and sinks her teeth down for a bite. Then her eyes track movement, and the movement of someone tall and dark-haired.

It's him.

He's back at school, and looking gloomier than ever.

Marianne doesn't know why her breath catches, until she realizes it's because her lungs temporarily forgot how to function.

She starts coughing, setting down her burger to pound her chest.

"You okay?" Sunny asks around a sip of a tall can of Peace Tea; peach, his favorite. "You, uh, you're turning red."

"I-I'm o- _hack_ -kay," she sputters, clearing her throat. "Just… went down the wrong pipe."

She looks up again, and McBoggart is nowhere to be found. She looks behind her for good measure, eyes briefly scanning the college cafeteria, but he's really gone.

She blinks for a second, then resumes eating, but slowly.

Drawing class is gonna be _awkward_.

* * *

Bog apologizes again to the professor. "I have a lot on my plate right now," he explains vaguely, and he tries his best to keep his temper in check. "It won't happen again."

"A whole week of an art class is a lot to miss," the professor reminds with a sigh. "We did two in-class projects you'll have to make up if you don't want to take a zero. I know it's 'only drawing' to some of you kids, but… art does more wonders than getting an extracurricular credit."

And then the lecture is over, and Bog can unclench his fists and return to his seat before the other students start to file in. He's so glad he came early; it would have been embarrassing to be caught getting chewed out. Somehow, it's insulting that teachers still lecture their students on being late or absent when it's _college,_ and Bog is just as much of an adult as the people teaching him, and any hour he's even here is on his own time and money, which is none of their business. It's voluntary, but mandatory. So why the hell are they bitching?

Marianne is the third person to enter the room, and when she does, she steals a glance in Bog's way, and it doesn't go unnoticed. She looks away quickly afterward, but not in a cute, 'Oh no my crush saw me' way. It's definitely in a, 'the fuck is he doing here' way. Anger boils beneath Bog's skin. He grinds his teeth a little.

"All right! Today, class, I thought we would do something a little different. Remember how we discussed positive and negative space last week, and went over the value scale? Well, today, I thought we could experiment with making positively and negatively spaced shapes and explore the contrast of light and shadow by using India ink with brushes and draw portraits of each other's faces when a light is shone on them from different angles.

"You know how spooky it looks when you hold a flashlight under your chin? It'll be like that! Now, I don't want you to focus on detail or 'getting someone's face right'; this is an exercise, with no sketches or varying values; just two values, and just shapes. I'm going to pair you off, get you familiar with some of the other people in the room besides who you sit with, and to give you some variations of faces.

"Ready? Now, I'll choose the models first, and set you up in the center with the drawing lamps, and I'll try to get some good angles for some deep shadows. Then the rest of you sitting in your seats can get to work on the model in front of you. Sure to be a lot of interesting angles to look at!"

God, this professor likes to talk way too much. Bog rolls his eyes and accepts the ink, paper, and calligraphy brush handed to him as the teacher goes around passing out supplies. Then Bog waits, seeing who gets set in front of him.

The professor smiles and gestures to the stool in front of Marianne. "James, would you mind?"

"It's Bog," he corrects automatically. Realization dawns on him half a heartbeat later. "…Wait, _there?_ Y-you want me to model?"

"Absolutely!" the drawing professor says enthusiastically. "Please, come sit in front of Marianne."

Marianne looks between her teacher and Bog, an expression of torn dismay on her face. Bog scowls. He feels the same, really.

"Fuck no, I know why you want me to model. Lot of 'interesting angles' on my face, huh? Sure to scare the shit out of anyone who looks my way. I'll pass, thanks! You want someone with 'interesting angles'? Why don't you model _yourself!"_ Bog says defiantly; low and irritated at first, but by the end, his voice has risen and he's tensed into a standing position.

The professor looks both wounded and defeated. He should be angry. Bog regrets his words and sits down. Why isn't the professor angry?

The older man chuckles weakly, sadly. "No, you're right. Maybe for the first round, I'll be one of the models to break the ice, get the shier artists out of their shells." He takes the seat in front of Marianne, and assigns some blonde with her hair in a ponytail and her bangs up in a headband, sweats and Uggs and a t-shirt with a thin, open hoodie plopping down into Bog's view, blocking Marianne and the professor from sight. This girl is chewing gum, and looks down to secretly text people while the light shines to the bottom left of her face.

"And… begin!" the teacher says, and the poor man does have a lot of winkles and cheeks gaunt nearly like Bog's, but in a more tired, sagged manner.

They spend about ten minutes on each piece, switching out models and artists, until Bog finally has to model. He passes by the teacher during this switch out, and apologizes quietly. The teacher smiles, and apologizes briefly for making Bog uncomfortable. Bog doesn't get it; he should have been kicked out of the room, or yelled at, or failed. But this teacher is too forgiving, and it makes Bog feels even more like shit.

Bog sits down in front of Marianne. She's already been a model twice, and now it's her second turn to draw.

"Begin!" the professor calls.

"Hey," she says.

"Hey," he replies.

"Nice going, insulting the professor."

"Don't remind me. – And I apologized, all right?" he mutters, then leans forward to hiss defensively.

"Don't move."

"Oh. Right," he stops, and leans back to where he was. He breathes heavily out his nose and closes his eyes. The light is a bit blinding to one side, and he can't really stand to see Marianne studying him so closely.

"You know, I don't blame you for acting out like that. I would have done the same if he picked on me first like that," she says as she fills in some shadow. She takes her time on this one, unlike her previous model. She was told not to 'get it right,' but she wants to do the amazing shadows on Bog's face justice. They really are incredible, the way his scars divert the light, the way his brows hang, the way his cheekbones and jaw shame him.

"I overreacted."

"Maybe. And maybe the professor underreacted when you basically called him out on his old-ass face," she smiles. "But he's been a dick to a lot of people while you were gone. He kind of singles out people who are good artists with developed styles and praised them, saying in return that the people who aren't as good – and he names names, too – should work harder and take note on what the good artist did. It's fucking low," she murmurs so not to be heard by the topic of conversation himself. She scoffs and outlines some white space, then makes another mark for a shadow to fill in. She pauses, and with his eyes closed and his brow starting to relax, Marianne forgets for a second to put her brush to paper. She clears her throat and looks down to make the final mark, in time for Bog to peek an eye open.

"Christ. I look like Frankenstein's monster."

Marianne looks up again, then bursts out laughing. She puts her face in one hand and sniggers. "Oh my God, you really do. Like the old black-and-white, all shadows and light. God, I'm sorry. I suck at this, you really don't look like that in person, I promise." She pulls her face from her hand to peer down at her work again. Now she doesn't see Bog in her drawing; all she sees is ol' Frankie.

"Burn that paper when we're done here."

"Believe you me, I am," Marianne agrees, looking back at her drawing again and grinning. "Shit, it really is awful. I did better on the soft-faced blonde with the ponytail who wouldn't sit still or stop snapping her gum."

A small smile grows on his lips. "Aye, compared to me, she's nae a challenge."

"A level three versus a level eleven. Out of ten."

He chuckles. "I wonder if she isn't made of gum herself, her features are so smooth and soft."

"She even smells minty, doesn't she? I can't tell if it's her gum or some kind of lotion or face cream!"

"It can't be her gum, it would have lost flavor by now."

Marianne laughs again, then utters lowly, "Good lord, we are mean."

"Aw, c'mon. It's in jest. A way to shake out the nerves," Bog shrugs, reclining.

"Yeah. To be honest, I think she's the prettiest girl here. And unlike my sister, she doesn't seem to dress like she cares about the title at all."

"Now hold up a minute, aren't you forgetting her competition?"

Marianne stops short, unsure if he means –

"The art teacher. He's certainly the prettiest," Bog finishes, and both out of relief and humor, Marianne laughs so hard she snorts.

The snort seems to wake up the room, and pull everyone from their own chatting and drawing. The teacher ends the class, and after packing up her things, Marianne goes up to Bog's seat and hands him her drawing of him.

"Do you want to do the honors of ridding the world of this heinous rendition of you?"

"It would be my pleasure to exact justice," he says, and he takes it, turns to the closest sink in the art room, and proceeds to whip out his lighter and set the paper ablaze, dropping it into the dry metal below.

The teacher yells and rushes over, turning on the water, right as Marianne and Bog flee the scene.


	5. Five: Sisterly Bonding

The air has grown cold this month, and it's into the fifth week of classes. Marianne hasn't been back to the bar in a while, and on the days that Bog is in class, Marianne tries not to ignore him any longer. They don't really strike up conversation, but… she will look his way, or make a gesture, or smile, and sometimes he does the same.

Marianne isn't sure about him. And she doesn't like being unsure about _anything._

"Dawn? Hey, can I talk to you for a minute?" she asks, knocking lightly on Dawn's open bedroom door.

The blonde perks up and removes one earbud from her ears. It's plugged into her phone, and she seems to be listening to Spotify and playing a game at the same time.

"Hey, come on in!" she says cheerfully, and then curses under her breath when she dies in her name. "Darn it. This game is so hard, but I love it so much. It's so colorful!" She sets her phone aside and stops the music, clicking the lock to shut the screen off. "Okay! You have my undivided attention. What's up, sis?"

"Well, I know I was… kind of an ass about talking to you before about Roland…"

"A total ass. Downright closed-lipped about it, actually. I still don't know what happened. Care to share with the class?" Dawn replies sternly, but not unkindly.

Marianne sighs and sits down backward in the stolen kitchen table chair that Dawn sometimes uses at her vanity. She places her arms over the backrest and straddles the seat. "Okay, so. I'm only going to tell this story once. But before I start, what do you know?"

"Well," she says, thinking about it as she looks off into the distance with her sky-blue eyes and taps her chin with a fingertip, trying to recall. "I know Dad was upset, 'cause he likes Roland's family and golfs with Roland's dad, and I know Dad was easily fooled by Roland's charm and wasn't around him long enough to see that Roland is preeeeetty much the _biggest_ narcissistic dickbag on the face of the Earth, the whole complete selfish-and-shallow package who just wanted Daddy's money, aaaand I know that he must have cheated on you, because you kind of beat the snot out of his sculpted face and this other girl had to pull you off, but you wouldn't hurt her, so you stopped. We had to pay your bail! And we're just lucky Roland's fam didn't press charges."

Marianne heaves a sigh and nods glumly, picking at the nubs on her old hoodie. "That about sums it up."

"Not the relationship part, though. And not how you _felt,_ which is the most important part of all," Dawn reminds, and she crawls to the end of her bed to tuck one foot under her other knee, dangling it off the bed, and leans over to touch her older sister's hair, brushing it back. "So… tell me that now? Pretty please?" and she puts her hands into optimal begging position, complete with puppy-dog pout.

Marianne softens. "All right, all right…

"So, I was headed over to Roland's to surprise him. Dad set us up to begin with, and at first I wasn't sure about Roland, but he _was_ hot, with those rare emerald green eyes of his and that hair that did the curly thing. It was cute, and he was all about showmanship, so he always remembered to bring me flowers and chocolates and open doors and pull out seats for me. It was a super mature and polite attitude for a high schooler, so yeah, of course I bought into it. You did, too, for a while. You even told me I was the luckiest girl alive to have such a thoughtful boyfriend."

"I did, and I am so, _so_ sorry that I did spy on him more like a good little sister does."

Marianne laughs and shakes her head. "No, you did just fine. It was easy to fall for his manipulation, especially since he was only the second guy I dated. And the first was only for two weeks, so maybe he doesn't really count as someone I had a relationship with. Roland was an actual relationship; we were together for two years, the whole latter half of my high school career! And he was talking about maybe marrying me after we graduate, and you _know_ how ecstatic Dad was about _that,_ so I felt pressured to say yes. Plus, I was so naïve… I figured that is just what you do, right? Marry your high school sweetheart and get that happily-ever-after sort of fairy tale ending?

"But anyway, I got off track. I went to go surprise him one day, right? I brought The Blob, because super old horror films are hilarious and good to make out to, and I had a little bag of goodies; popcorn, snowcaps, gummy bears – classic movie stuff. He answers the door, and he hardly opens it a crack. His hair is tousled in a not-for-style way, and his lips are swollen pink, and his belt is undone and his shirt is caught in his zipper.

"'Eyyy, there, Buttercup… what're you doin' here?' he drawls, and god, looking back on him, how did I ever date someone with a southern accent that obnoxious?"

"Off-track again, Mari," Dawn reminds.

"Right, right… So he says that, and man, I'm naïve but I'm not stupid. I know the messy way he looks can only mean one thing. So I kick the door, and stumbles because he was leaning on it, and I brush past him to his room. Sure enough, there's a girl there, some other petite little brunette with big gushy eyes and confusion and shock on her face when she sees me, and she's thinner than me and her skin is soft and a little tan and freckled, and God, I was so jealous because she was way prettier than me. But I know it's not her fault. Even if she knew about me, she's not the cheater. _He_ is.

"So I turn back, find him in the hallway making excuses, hands up in mock innocence, and I fuckin' lose it. I go apeshit, and start screaming at him and I'm crying and my whole body is on fire, my muscles tense and my nails cutting into my palms and my face feeling like its going to melt off. I jump on him and tackle him to the ground, but I don't know how to fight yet, so I'm just aimlessly hitting and hitting and clawing at his clothing. The other girl must've gotten over her shock, because soon she's running for us, and while Roland tries to lift me off of him, she's got her arms around my waist and is trying to yank me off.

"So I stop. I nearly turned and elbowed her in the ribs or bashed her teeth in, but when I saw her crying too, and how sorry she looked… I couldn't do it. And Roland was blubbering like the pathetic slug he is, so I decided he isn't even worth my time. I get up, I hug the girl and tell her that I don't blame her, and then I kick him once while he tries to get up, just fgor good measure. And I never went back to him again, and especially not after he called the cops on me."

Dawn has been very quiet, listening intently, and once it seems like Marianne is finished, she prods, "Then what?"

Marianne sighs. "Well, I toughened up. I stopped being so naïve and trusting. I broke up with Roland, no matter how many times he tried to beg me back, and Dad let him. I took self-defense classes, paid for them with my summer job, and took up fencing and boxing. I got fit. I got good. I never said 'yes' to a setup ever again, and… and I shut you and Dad out. Which – which I'm so, so sorry for, Dawn. You didn't deserve that. You've always been there for me, and always asked about it to try to get me to open up, but I didn't want to. I just wanted to sit and feed on my bitterness, shoving that… th-that utter betrayal and hurt and jealousy and rage and heartbreak down and down and down deeper and deeper until I-I hopefully just… just forgot about it."

"But that never works, Marianne," awn utters gently, her voice small and soft. She takes her sister's hand in both of hers. "That only leads to you stewing on it and remembering it forever. And I'd never ask you to forgive scum like that, but… forgiving yourself is different."

"I don't know if I _have_ forgiven myself," Marianne whispers, unable to look at her sister. Tears pool in her eyes, and she lets them fall while her voice chokes up and her mouth pulls at the ends. She can taste the rise of water in her mouth. "I regret getting so violent, I regret being so cold to Dad, I regret not talking to you, I regret locking myself away and never telling you guys where I was going all the time, when I was just going to learn to fight."

Dawn pulls her into her arms and shushes her, rubbing soothing circles on her big sister's back. "It's okay, it's okay. We've forgiven you a long time ago, and hey… you've gotten a lot better. You don't use those fighting skills on anyone, really. You fended off a bully Sunny had once, that big, mean girl, Lizzie, who'd force him to do her homework and kept stealing his lunch money – but it's not like you purposely got into fights just to punish yourself, which I always respected. You protect me and you protect Sunny and you protect yourself, and I'm proud of you."

Marianne smiles and her tears seem to be slowing, her hiccups waning. She'd been sobbing the whole time Dawn spoke, but now, the time to cry seems to be passing. It feels good. The volcano finally erupted, and now it can settle down.

"Hey… you never did say what brought this on," Dawn realizes with a puzzled frown. She pulls Marianne out to arm's length to face her. "What's on your mind?"

"One sec," Mari responds, and she gets up to go blow her nose and grab her water bottle. After her nostrils are more or less clear and her mouth has been cleansed, her throat hydrated, she wipes her eyes and tells Dawn, "I wanted to talk to you about something recent, and I realized that before I did, I had to clarify what I didn't talk to you about before."

"Like, when you open up you want to open up about everything, huh?" Dawn smiles a little, then nods. "That is so like you. Like the time you told Dad about three different things you broke that you kept blaming me for, and when you confessed to the last one, suddenly you told him about the other two, and it was like all the truths being revealed at once."

Marianne laughs fully now. "Yeah! Yes, exactly like that." Just goes to show that people never really change at their root. She goes on, "Anyway… well, actually… Hm. How do I begin about this?" and she chews on one of her loose cuticles.

"Be general, then get specific. That's what I did when I didn't know how to start a paper back in high school," Dawn suggests.

"Good idea," Marianne beams. She clears her throat, gets serious. She begins, "You know how you see familiar people sometimes, because you live in the same area and shop at the same places, but then there's that one person you see over and over, and they somehow keep turning up, and so they're this reoccurring mystery to you, and you want to get to know them, but you're not sure how to do it without being… weird?"

Her sister frowns at her and slowly shakes her head. "Um... no, Marianne. I seriously have never experienced that, but! I kind of get it, so if you want to tell me about it, I guess I'm all ears?"

"Well," Marianne continues hesitantly, "There's this… guy."

"OOOOH!" Dawn coos, hyped up instantly. She bounces a little up and town where she sits, and pulls her legs into a pretzel shape, leaning forward to grab a pillow and hug it. In a sing-song voice, she adds, " _Tell me more, tell me more – like, does he have a car?_ "

"Dawn!" Marianne whines, taking the pillow from her sister and bopping her in the shoulder with it. "Please don't get goofy on me. Please don't make this out to more than it is. I'm just… saying. It's a guy. That doesn't mean anything… romance-y."

Dawn laughs. "Okay, okay, I'll behave. And promise a minimal amount of _Grease._ "

" _Thank you,_ " Marianne utters lowly. "Now then… um. His name is James McBoggart? He's Scottish, like… full-blown accent and everything. He's… really tall, and kinda pale, and kinda lanky, but in a toned way, and his voice is really gruff, but sometimes gets this excited lilt to it, and he wears leather and boots and beaten old jeans, and he carries a lighter on him, so he might be a smoker? And it looks like he might have tattoos, although I can never see what they are –"

"Good God in heaven," Dawn cuts her list off, and her eyes are wide. "Did, like, some guy win the lottery for being totally your type all over? I have goosebumps, Marianne. Look," she shoves her forearm in the brunette's face. "That is how freaky this is. It's like if I had a random generator of all the stuff you'd like in a person and had it make that person, it'd be this guy, just from how you're describing him alone."

"Uhg, shut the fuck up," Marianne growls, pushing Dawn over on the bed. The blonde simply laughs, giggling her head off as she rolls on her back. Marianne shakes her head. From emotional hugging scene to this nonsense. This is what it's like to have a sister. "ANYWAY, my POINT is, he's kind of _different_ and I don't really know much about him, and we've only spoken maybe two or three times, really? So I don't know whether to call him even an acquaintance, and… the way he glares at me, and this weird unnerving feeling I get whenever I see him or think he's around – I can't tell if I actually hate him? If he, like, creeps me out or gives me bad vibes, or – or if I'm actually just really curious and eager to get to know him, you know? It's… very unclear."

"Are you asking me for advice?" Dawn chirps as she sits up again.

"…I'm asking for your _opinion._ I just want to know your thoughts on the matter at hand," Marianne answers carefully.

"Well, I think it's easy. You should talk to him more, try hanging out with him. If it were me, I'd just go up to him and be like – wait, what was his name again?"

"James McBoggart. But he tells people to call him Bog. The professor even calls him that, 'cause he got so mad when the teacher called him James."

" _Bog? **Really**?"_ Dawn scrunches up her nose. "That's so… gross. No one likes bogs. They're smelly and foggy and swampy and have gushy mud and drippy moss and brown icky water and probably a mummified corpse or two –"

"Thanks for that visual, yes."

" _Aaand_ it's just an ugly word! Bog backward is gob, you know. Like a goblin."

"Thanks, Dawn, _really_. I'm sure Bog would appreciate this commentary _immensely_."

The blonde rolls her eyes. "Aaanyway, I'm just saying, if it were me, I'd go up to him and be like, 'Heya, Boggy! Mind if I sit here? No? Cool. So, what are you into? Like, music and movies and TV shows and stuff. Tell me about your hobbies, do you play an instrument? Ride a motorcycle? Smoke weed?' – These are the important questions, Marianne. Don't bring home an addict, for starters."

"Ew, I wouldn't. Although you know marijuana isn't really that bad –"

"Drugs are drugs! Alcohol and cigarettes count, too. It's all nasty."

"What kind of Social Justice Warrior are you? You should be totally pro-weed. What about all the health benefits to, like, the oils that help with epilepsy and shit?"

"Lalalala, I'm not listening to your hippie mumbo-jumbo! Lalalala," Dawn pretends to plug her ears and turn her head, but her smile is a dead giveaway.

Marianne bops her with the pillow again.

"Bahhh, get out of my room. We're done here. You spilled your guts, we bonded, and now I'm really sleepy and have to get up early for work tomorrow. So just consider talking to him more, okay? And I'll see you in Retail Hell. OooOOooh!" and she wriggles her fingers while she moans like a ghost, before slipping under her covers. "Shut out my light and close my door on your way out, 'kay?"

"'Kay," Marianne concedes, flicking off the light first. "Goodnight, Dawn. And thank you." She starts to close the door, then adds, "Love you."

"Love you too… G'night."

And Dawn falls asleep in record time, and Marianne prays her own dreams come at least half as quickly.


	6. Six: Decorated Skin

He can't decide if this morning is a hot shower morning or a cold shower morning.

On the one hand, one final burst of summer has returned, right at the brink of October. Clinging to these September days, the heat likes to remind everyone that this is the unpredictable Midwest, with thick, lush forests and lake effects from the Greats and wide, open plains with hills and valleys all rolled into one chaotic pattern of weather.

Global warming with ozone layer destruction might be a thing, too, so there's that.

Needless to say, Bog can feel the sweat making his old off-white tank stick to his skin, and normally, this calls for a cold shower.

But something about the state of his insides feels cold to the core, and he can't help but shiver. It makes a hot shower sound very, very tempting.

Sighing, he rolls out of bed and peels the cotton from his skin, yanking his shirt up over his head and tossing it to the floor. He shimmies out of his sleep pants, commando, because who needs underwear when one's just unconscious for a few hours at night, and every pair of men's sleep pants has that convenient little section all men's boxers do? Why fight the layers to piss in the middle of the night? No need, really.

He walks to his tiny bathroom and flights on the light. All but one light bulb remains above the sink, and the effect is rather depressing. He yawns, scratches at his stubble. He leans toward the mirror and frowns. Boy, are his eyes bloodshot, and my, who yanked his sockets down and made them blue? He looks like an addict who hasn't slept in a week.

Bog shrugs it off and turns on the shower, touching the spray down from the head, waiting for it to heat up. He turns and flips open the toilet in the meantime.

Once the water's finally hot, he slips inside and lets all the sweat sluice off his skin, and he tilts his head back and closes his eyes. That's better.

He hears his cat mew from the doorway of the bathroom, still ajar. The teeny guy slips inside, brushing against the glass door of the shower stall.

"Peeping tom," Bog grins at Bones, and kicks the glass to make the cat leave. "Go on, git!"

He doesn't. He merely hops into the sink and curls up in its bowl.

"Aw, come on. I need to shave there next," Bog mutters while she starts to shampoo his hair. "Gotta look my best for work. Only professionals there."

The cat yawns lazily in response, and Bog ignores the fluffball while he continues to get ready.

All clean, he steps out and towels off, applies lotion and shoos the cat away as he preps to start shaving. His stubble will be back halfway through his shift, but he doesn't like to skip shaving, lest he have a full beard on his hands within a week. In between shaving strokes, Bog glances at his tattoos. Most of them are in places he can't see without a mirror.

Dragonfly wings spread out across Bog's shoulder blades and onto the backs of his arms, one pair across his broad shoulders and biceps, the other pair down the sides of his back and ribs. They are lines in black and accented in watercolors of magenta, blue, green, and violet to recreate that iridescent look. They took ages to tattoo, with multiple visits back and forth. But they're satisfying, and they coincide with the primroses and vines that start between the wings at his shoulder blades with the biggest of the blossoms, and branch out up his spine, curling at the nape of his neck, and spiraling down his trapezius onto his arms opposite the wings, forming ringlets wrapping around his forearms, scatter primrose petals between the leaves and vines, thorns added not for accuracy, but for his prickly nature. At the base of his spine, too, is a pinecone mossed over at its edges, being carried along the back of a weary brown grasshopper.

The wings are his desire for freedom, but the fragility of how long that freedom lasts. The primroses are for old loves who came and went in a flash, like spring, and left thorns in his side. And the weight of the pinecone atop the grasshopper is his own way of showing the weight of his regrets and responsibilities and the challenges he faces, as well as a little inside joke between him and his mother that if one were to stand a grasshopper upright with its legs extended, it would most like have roughly the same proportions that Bog does. It's always been a funny thought, too, how grasshoppers have grotesque faces with gruesome mandibles, and touching his own jaw now while baring his teeth, chipped from fights, too poor to really get them fixed… well, we identifies, to say the least.

Bog brushes those misshapen teeth and gargles his morning breath away – or should he say evening breath? He slept all day again, having been up all night, and having to work all night tonight – and turns to drop his towel into the hamper and get dressed.

The scars really bother him. He's tried to cover some of them up with tattoos, like the ones at his left elbow and the few on his ribcage and back, but he can't hide the ones on his face.

Some of them are from close encounters of the knife kind, switchblades pulled in a last-ditch effort in a scuffle. But a majority of them are from that fateful day.

He shudders. He still can't look at semi-trucks the same way. Every time he passes one on the highway, he steers as clear of it as possible, and has a very rational fear of compact cars, too. Flipping over and over in that sort of vehicle after spinning out on the highway because of a blown-out tire on the semi beside you will do that to a man.

Bog tries not to think about it.

But on mornings like this where he wakes up feeling sluggish and off-balance and on edge… he can't help but reflect on every tattoo and every scar, and everything about himself that he loathes and tries to hide. He wishes he never got the primroses. He wishes he really were a grasshopper or dragonfly, and fly away.

He wishes for a lot of things.

He finishes putting on his jacket and grabs his keys. He feeds his cat, then puts his helmet on.

Mostly, he wishes for this night to end quickly, so he can crawl right back into bed again.

* * *

"Are you going to that filthy bar again?" Dawn scolds as she places her hands on her hips and hovers around Marianne.

The brunette tucks her hair into her helmet, and lifts the visor. "Well, what else am I supposed to do on payday while you and Sunny go see a comedy I don't care about?"

"You should come with us! You might laugh," the blonde suggests.

"What, and spoil your date? No way, I could never do that to Sunny," and she snickers to herself.

Dawn looks simultaneously confused and a little embarrassed. "Just… don't do anything stupid, and if you get too drunk, call us! Sunny can ride your bike back, and I can pick you up."

"I think I'd be safer driving drunk," she snorts. Dawn takes no offense, merely groans.

"You. Drive. Me. Crazy!" Dawn laughs, and flips Marianne's visor down to plant a kiss, successfully smudging the plastic.

"Ewww, first you steal my line, then you grease up my helmet with your lip gloss? You disgust me," Marianne mock blanches, then lightly taps a fake punch to Dawn's cheek. "Love you. Don't wait up for me. I have tomorrow off, so I intend to live it up."

Marianne leaves, and signals Sunny 'good luck' and a thumbs up on her way out, to which he sticks his tongue out at her.

Opening the apartment door, however, a slip of paper falls, and Marianne stops short. "Dawn?" she asks, lifting her visor. "Did anyone knock or something? Looks like we have a notice or missed a package or –" she stops cold when she turns the paper over and looks at it.

"What?" Dawn calls, and walks over to the doorway. She frowns, trying to peer over her sister's shoulder. "What is-? Oh… That… looks like Roland's handwriting. And he's the only person to ever call you _Buttercup._ " She shudders. "Gross. Is he in town or something?"

Marianne's mouth has run dry. She feels a mix of tears and fear welling up inside her.

"Marianne?" Dawn asks, genuine worry in her tone.

She balls the paper up in her hands and throws it violently downward. It reeks of his cologne. "I have to go."

"Marianne!" Dawn protests, stooping to pick up the paper and read it for herself.

 _My sweet Buttercup,_

 _It seems my travels to university have been a success! I am graduated and coming home, and I would just love to see you again. I have a feeling I know where I might find you, and I hope this letter is to the right address. I'll see you soon, my dear. Wait for me._

 _Roland._

Dawn's a bit panicked. How did he get their address? Did their Dad have something to do with it? And what does he mean, he knows where to find Marianne? Does he mean at school, or work…?

"Marianne, wait! Should we call the cops? This is totally stalking! We can't let him –" she chases after Marianne, down the flight of stairs, but Marianne is too fast. She has the speed of a woman on a mission, undeterred and chock full of emotion. By the time Dawn reaches the exit of the apartment building, Marianne is running down the parking lot to her bike and getting on it and starting it up.

Dawn waits in the doorway, torn. She nibbles on her plush pink lips, then turns and heads upstairs to inform Sunny.

"…What do we do?" she wants to know.

He doesn't have an answer. He shakes his head sadly. "Nothing we can do until Roland shows his face and does something. This letter won't exactly make the police sweat, you know. And with their history… they'll blame Marianne, not Roland," he answers meekly.

Dawn sighs and sets the letter on the kitchen countertop. She goes in for a hug, and Sunny gladly supplies one. "I'm just… _so_ worried about her. All my life, she's worried about me. Fought my battles for me, sheltered me, taught me things, mothered me after Mom died. But this time, it's my turn."

"She can handle herself," Sunny reminds her, pulling out of the hug. He smiles and boops her nose. "Marianne just needs time to sort it out. Remember what I always tell you: _Don't worry… about a thing. 'Cause –"_

 _"Every little thing, is gonna be alright,"_ Dawn finishes with him, harmonizing. She bites her lip, then nods. "Yeah. Yeah, I think so, too. We'll figure it out, and for now… let her blow off some steam."

* * *

She doesn't go straight for the King's Castle. She takes a detour, heads for the long stretches of scenic road on the edges of town.

The trees are all changing, bright reds and yellows, some clinging to their greens. The orange ones are her favorite; most people like the red ones, but Marianne is partial to the orange. They burn like embers and fall the same way. She curves on the road, kicking up the speed. Cops rarely camp out here. She can be as free as a butterfly here. She flits from side to side in the right lane, and no one's coming or going. She feels the churn in her stomach, and it's so good. The rush cancels out her deeper uneasiness.

Coming back into town after one gas-wasting ride through the forest-lined areas, Marianne slows her speed to normal and cruises to the little tattoo parlor with the best artist in town. She parks her bike, struts right in.

Tonight's the night for a little distraction. Some fresh pain will do.

She greets the artists and finds her gal.

"Hey, Plum," she greets, and Sugar Plum does a little dance in her seat. She's a feisty middle-ages woman with a pear-shaped body, all big hips and ass and thighs, her skinny arms done up the wazoo in faeries and pixie dust and potions and adorable witches and cats and insects and mushrooms, like an entire fairy tale book threw up in the most creative, acid-trip-flow manner possible onto her body. It carries on to her collar bones and what Marianne can see of her ankles, so probably up her legs, too. There probably isn't much space on this woman that isn't tattooed, and it all seems to tell a story.

"Marianne! Long time no see, my girl. Here for another piercing? Maybe a palm-reading? How about some tarot?" She reads Marianne's expression, then chuckles. "Or are you actually here to get decorated this time?" she wants to know, her grin wide and eager.

"The latter," the brunette says, and without appointment or ceremony, drops down into Sugar Plum's chair. She doesn't even know the woman's real name; she was told while getting her industrial that Plum uses this as her stage name, has since her bellydancing days, and she calls it her Bohemian name. But Marianne likes to think that Sugar Plum's real name is something old and sweet, like Dianne or Dot; something reminiscent of the '50s rockabilly, because despite her gypsy trades, she dresses in that fashion.

"Awwooo, I'm as excited as a 'gator with a goat!" Plum exclaims, and messily ties back her blonde hair a faded blue-green underbelly. "What'll ya have? I've a whole gallery on my skin, if you like! And there's my portfolio danglin' off the chair, there."

Marianne shakes her head. She takes out her phone, having forgotten the paper copy of her drawing during her impulsive decision. "I want this, if you please. But my style isn't the greatest; feel free to embellish a little on the wings, you're better at them than I am. But I want the rest the same; I want my own art on myself."

"I totally understand that!" Plum chuckles, taking the phone and without asking, sending the image to herself so she can easily pull it up on her own phone and keep it on without getting locked out. "So much so, that I don't want to embellish the wings, darlin'; I like how you did 'em. They suit the image too well. I'll make it exactly like this. But don't you want color? This is in pens and pencils."

"I do," she says. "Make the wings your best purples. And add some of that watercolor effect pooling under the primrose, okay?"

"Certainly, dear! And where'll ya have it?" she asks. "Remember, we charge by the hour here, not so much location or size."

"I want it on my right shoulder blade," she says without hesitation. "I was going to do it above my heart, but… I don't want to put a symbol of love in a warm place. I want it on my cold shoulder."

"Love is a battle," Sugar Plum agrees as she gets her tools sterile and ready. Meanwhile, Marianne removes her jacket and shirt, sliding down one bra strap. She doesn't care if anyone sees her. But Plum draws up the red velvet curtain around her workspace anyway. "Whoa there! Have you no shame?"

"Not a lick," Marianne beams.

Sugar Plum laughs and nods. "Wellp, me, either, darlin'. Now do you prefer to lean forward, or lie down? You'll be here an hour, at least, if not more. I want you comfortable. And I can always stop and you can change position."

"I'll lean forward," she says softly. "I'm too on edge to lay down."

"Alright," Plum says, and she doesn't prod why. She does a test poke with no ink on Marianne's skin. "It's going to feel like that, you know. Only over and over and over again, like a stinging hummingbird."

The brunette grits her teeth. "I can take it."

"…I know you can, doll," Plum sighs, and assembles the right colors before getting all her gear on and settling in. "Now hold still; we've a masterpiece to make."


	7. Seven: Moth, Meet Flame

His class before Drawing was cancelled, and now he has an hour to kill. He finds a place to drop his stuff, jacket and bag and all, but doesn't feel like sitting. He leans against the wall and crosses his long legs at the ankle, sinking one hand into his pocket while the other surfs through his iPod. Finding a song, he slips his headphones over his ears and presses play while he rests his head against the white brick wall and rests his eyes.

He's alone in this corridor, possibly the entire wing, and deems it safe to sing along.

 _"I've been cast out, sequestered. Pushed the fuck around. Blindsided, beaten, locked up and bound._

 _"Always thought I was human, but maybe I was wrong. I've been treated like an animal since the day I was born."_

Bog starts to strum some air guitar; all accurate strums, because he set out to learn this song not long after he first heard it on the radio.

 _"The wounds that I wear are the crown upon a king. So heavy they lie, with all the pain that they bring._

 _"My life is full of longing, but for what I'll never know. I've been drawn in to the fire as I reap what I sow…"_

This isn't a band he follows regularly. Normally his tastes in music are a bit more classic metal and rock than this modern tune, but Lord, he couldn't relate more to a song's lyrics if he tried.

 _"Like a moth to a flame… my wings burn away._

 _"When things are too beautiful, I smash them to pieces; the more that you love me, insecurity releases. I'll be the one that's to blame; so I'll sell my soul to blaze… Like a moth to a flame. Like a moth to a flame…"_

He bobs his head a little, a subtle head bang, and strums a few more chords, launching into the second verse, eyes still closed,

 _"The ruler of the kingdom that ends up the pawn; so tired of thinking of where it all went wrong._

 _"Friendships, they come and go, and sometimes they end –"_

He hears a long, low whistle through his headphones, and immediately snaps his eyes open, voice trailing off. He pauses his music.

Marianne is looking at him with an astonished stupor, with a hint of… Is that admiration?

"The fu-! Whuh… H-How long have you been standing there?" Bog sputters, agered at first, and then just plain mortified.

"Since 'life full of longing,'" Marianne replies, still staring at him. She moves to sit down on one of the cushioned benches adjacent to the one Bog placed all his belongings. "Do you realize how incredible your singing voice is? Seriously, you could start a band with that voice! Or go into theatre, or something," she says, still amazed. "Have you ever tried pursuing a music career?"

"I'm not… that good," he mutters, grateful that his headphones can hide the embarrassment burning his ears. He's never been complimented like this before, especially not on his vocals. Oh, sure, his mother thinks he has the voice of a saint, but that's his mother. "Besides, I already 'ave a job. I can't jus' abandon it for the sake of a career that will get me nowhere. Yae every heard of people jus' gettin' up an' discovered out of the blue? Not likely. You've gottae have connections, and I have neu one."

Marianne stifles a giggle behind her hand, and makes a sort of throat-clearing noise instead. He seems flustered, and when he's flustered, apparently his accent gets thicker. She's mindful not to point this out to him, but it's kind of fantastic.

"You have a point," she admits. "Still… it's a waste of talent if people don't hear that voice, man. That's something to share with the world."

His face deadpans. "Now yer mockin' me," he growls, indignantly dropping down to sit on his jacket, removing his headphones and tucking his iPod away. Well, good; that shows he at least won't ignore her, and maybe wants a conversation.

"I'm certainly not! Trust me," she levels with him, "If I were mocking you, you'd know."

He snorts, but without humor. He fiddles with his sleeves, starting to roll them down.

"Can I see your ink?" Marianne asks politely. "I just got my first done."

"Didja now?" Bog says, faintly amused. He stops rolling down his sleeves, considers it. He has an open dark heather grey button-up with buttons the color of the moon, with a well-loved Ramones shirt underneath. He ultimately gives her a sort of shrugging nod, granting, "Why the hell not," as he peels back his button up and removes it entirely, rolling up his t-shirt sleeves to his shoulders. The petals are vague enough that she hopefully won't know which flower it is, and its meaning to boot, and he sretches his arm out and turns it to show her both sides. "The wings carry on to me back, and there's another pair. The sleeves aren't complete yet, I don't think. I think I want to add some Celtic knots and chains in between the vines and leaves. Might as well embrace the stereotype, yeah? People less Scot than I have Celtic ink."

Marianne is about to touch his arm, but stops before she truly begins. "Um… may I?" she asks politely, almost shyly, and he looks away, acting like he doesn't care either way. She murmurs, "Thanks," and gently holds his wrist, turning his arm this way and that, her other hand tracing with almost ticklish fingers up the vines, following the edges of the leaves and swooping around a petal. "They're so intricate… is this Plum's handiwork too?"

"You know Sugar Plum?" he asks.

Marianne nods. "Mhmm. She did mine. She's also the one who gave me all these," and she tilts her head and pulls back her hair opposite the undercut to shoe both ears, decked out. "She keeps telling me I would look so good with a nose piercing or one on my brow, but I don't want to put holes in my face, or anywhere else for that matter. Just my ears."

He chuckles, a deep, warm sound, and Marianne realizes she's still holding his arm. She releases him. He says as he rolls down his sleeves and puts his other shirt back on, "That Plum. She keeps trying to talk me into piercing my ears, or getting gages. She once tried to talk me into doing my nipples, too. I think she just wants everybody to be as decked out as she is, but that really isn't my style."

"Yeah, mine either," Marianne agrees. "My ears aren't even that bad, when you look at hers," and she laughs. She gestures with a thumb to her back. "Want to see what she gave me?"

"Oh, I expect you to show me now. You brought it up, and it's only fair," Bog insists.

Marianne smiles. She shrugs off her jacket and stretches the fabric of her sleeve back as far as she can, to show the tattoo on her shoulder blade. "Before you ask, yes, I did draw it. That's why it doesn't look as good, but Plum insisted she not embellish it with her style, that it should be mine."

Bog smiles, "Rightly so, because I doubt she could capture –" he stops. "Is… is that a primrose?"

"Huh?" Marianne lets her sleeve down. "Yeah, actually. I'm surprised you know, most guys would just see another girly-pink flower. But… they symbolize young love, and the sentiment, 'I can't –'"

"'I can't live without you,'" Bog finishes, and he looks like he's on vacation somewhere, lost in another time and place. "They are some of the first flowers of spring, and so often mean one's first love."

Marianne's eyes search his face, and then she peers down at his arm, and makes the connection. "Those petals on your tattoos…"

"Primrose petals," he admits quietly. "The full flower is on my back, between the wings." He looks uncomfortable, suddenly, like he can't stand to be here, or can't stand that Marianne is here. He scoots over, picks up his jacket from underneath him. He holds it like he isn't sure if he should put it on or not, unsure if he should leave.

But their class starts in half an hour.

"Was… was your first love –" the brunette tries, but he looks straight at her and cuts her off instantaneously.

"Don't!" he snaps, and his stare is intense. "Don't go there. You've no right."

"Well, sorry for asking," she agrees grumpily, and looks away quickly. She feels a little miffed, because while she wouldn't have answered him either if he'd asked, she still wants to know. She's mad that he's mad. She blows air out her mouth, idly wondering if he's about to leave. He doesn't.

He's wondering if she's going to leave. She doesn't.

They sit in silence for a while.

Bog, surprisingly, is the first to break it.

"Do you, uh… Are you… Did you get that tattoo because you had a breakup? Recently?"

Marianne shoots him a look. "Who the hell says you have the right to go there? It's none of your business!" She crosses her arms over her chest as her flare of angers dies down. "Why do you even want to know?"

"I didn't!" he tosses back just as hotly, then starts to gradually lose steam as well. "I just wondered, since- well. And it's just hard to believe someone like you wouldn't have a-" He gives up. "It's not like I was trying to…" and he shakes his head, suddenly back to being hot again. "I was just trying to strike conversation, it was all I could think of!"

"…Do you ever finish a sentence?" she says after a pause, her expression changing from being flummoxed to being somewhat charmed. "But I'm glad you didn't. Any one of those would have gotten you a swift kick in the arse."

He snorts. "I've no doubt, Tough Girl. 'Though I could take you on easily."

"You wanna bet?" said spitfire grins, always up to a challenge. She cracks her knuckles, fist to palm for each one.

He chuckles. "How cute. You want to spar with me?" he jokes.

"Any time, any place," she approves. "There's a shit storm blowing into town soon, and I'm all kinds of tense about it. A good match would help."

"Aye, it's better than any drug," the bar man agrees, and he runs his hand through his hair. "You know what? I was kidding, but… All right. You've got yourself a partner." He blinks, aiming to clarify. "Er… a sparring partner. How about after class? The workout facility on campus has a fantastic little martial arts area, complete with wooden swords and staffs. But that's just my preference."

"I'm game," Marianne is beside herself with anticipation. "You're in for a bad time. I've been in fencing and boxing, plus some self-defense classes."

"Oh," Bog treats her to a long, slow, devious grin. "Then I know I'm in for a very good time."

* * *

All throughout Drawing 101, Bog keeps staring down the clock. When he isn't eyeing its hands clicking about the face, he glances at Marianne, whom is also watching the clock. They both nervously dart their gazes between the clock, their drawings, and each other, but never at the same object at the same time.

Finally, the professor dismisses the class. Marianne is out of her seat while everyone else is still putting their supplies away. Bog is ready just as quickly, rising to meet her when she comes over to his table.

"Ready?" she asks, and there is a gleam in her eye, something fiery and wicked, and Bog can't stop the corners of his mouth from lifting into an answering smirk.

"You look like you could power an engine. Want to race?"

The biker gal feels like he read her mind. She bursting with so much energy that burning off some of it before the fight would benefit her more than hinder her. She grins cheekily back, then dashes for the door, and Bog is close behind her, nearly pushing her out of the way. She slips by him, though, and soon they're booking it down the stairs and out the building, jogging across the parking lots with their backpacks slapping their sides as they make their way to the gymnasium.

Even with his long legs, Marianne has better cardio. She reaches the entrance first, tapping the doors with her hand. She's breathing heavily. "I win! For that… I get… first punch."

"And I'll let…you have it," Bog gives a huff, and they both linger in the doorway to catch their breaths for a moment. "Christ. I stopped… smoking, but… it seems… my lungs are still… recovering."

"Well… I'm glad… you stopped," she breathes, switching from open-mouth to breathing through her nostrils to try and steady her heart, which seems to think it's still racing.

She waits for Bog's breathing to return to more or less normal, then she opens the door and gives it an extra shove with her arm for him to grab before she slips inside.

In the fitness facility, there are different rooms with just about anything one could imagine for physical health. There is a yoga class going on in the open-use gym, using some of the wrestling mats, and its instructor is the same woman who teaches Sunny's LGBT Studies class, one he took both for the sociology credit and to support his sister, whom he always says he wants to try to understand more.

In another room, there are weights, with multiple young men doing chin-ups and lifting and playing rap music from a portable boom box. In another, there's a full basketball court, and Marianne can't see where it is, but she can smell the chlorine for a pool.

Finally, down one corridor, she and Bog locate the martial arts room. No one is here for a class, and they have to turn the lights on when they enter. There are padded mats and posters with basic stances, and on a rack off to one side, there's wooden weaponry.

"Come on," Bog says, tossing down his jacket and button-up shirt, able to move freely. He picks up a staff and twirls it with ease. "I used to come here to practice, even before I became a student. You have to pay a fee to use the gym if you aren't enrolled, but it was worth it for all the equipment they have."

"You dork. You really came all the way to a college to play around with a stick?" she scoffs, even as she tosses down her own jacket and picks up a shorter weapon more resembling a katana.

"Well, sure," the other replies, side-stepping toward the center sparring mat and taking up a defensive stance, ready for her first blow. "See, back in Scotland, back when I was a young lad, we had a farm. Before my father had grand ideas of starting a pub in America, all we had were sheep. Guess who the herder was?"

"You're kidding me," Marianne snorts, taking position in front of him and touching her weapon to his. "You? Big tough guy with a dozen tattoos? You were a little shepherd boy?"

"And I promise I didn't fuck a single sheep," he smiles, "Despite the reputation Scots have for it."

She laughs outright and can't stop, even as she lunges forward for her first attack, and he blocks it. "You know," she remarks shrewdly, "Sheep have the most human-like vaginas, and dolphins are the close second."

"Ach, disgusting!" Bog replies in disbelief, reeling back to block another attack before sweeping toward her knees, which she quickly counters. "I donnae even want to know how you know that."

"Pointless trivia is one of my hidden specialties," Marianne says proudly, then a determined furrow of her brows takes over and she smirks, "Now let's get serious."

She releases a little roar, charging for him. He parries and turns, clanking wood behind his back and swooping for her head, and they clash back, forth, side, side, choreographed as if they planned it, as if they were swashbuckling pirates from long ago. The bar chef laughs, "Look at you!" and compliments, "You aren't half bad. But what if I do this?"

And he hops back a couple steps, only to pull a reversal and try to catch her off-guard. But she blocks him at the last second, pressing back against his staff until she can throw him off. Marianne blows hair out of her face and towns a spin attack, and he backs up with a small, "Whoa!" and had to bock the double-pound of her wooden sword from nearly hitting him square in the chest and abdomen.

"I'm impressed," he relays with a nod, then twirls the staff over his head while she paces around him, and he mirrors her steps. He stabs it into the mat. "But can you keep it up?"

"I could go for hours," she answers firmly, and he looks pleased.

"Good, so can I," and he flies forward, swinging and stabbing his staff out before him, and she has to cartwheel out of the way before dodging right and smacking his staff from the side. He tries to flip her blade, steer it out of her hands, and she tries to hold firm, counter the rotation. But she loses grip in the end, and it goes rolling and clanking down to the floor, flipped off the mat and onto the tile beyond.

Bog hesitates for a split second when he sees he actually succeeded, and that second is all Marianne needs to duck and rolls over to her weapon, snatching it up quickly and spinning to standing position from her crouch just in time to fight back.

A bit taken aback, Bog and blocks each one, fast and furious as they come out. He lands a few blows himself, ones Marianne blocks but just barely, and even with his height advantage, she seems to be faster. His reflexes are keener, but her movements are more fluid.

He's starting to like this girl.

"I have to say," Marianne chimes in after a few missed blows that land on punching bags or a stack of mats as Bog moves off of the mat and starts to use the room to his advantage, "You're holding up pretty well for a farm boy."

"I could say the same for a dainty thing such as yourself," Bog returns, and he aims high to come down, and Marianne has to use both hands on the flat edge of her wooden sword to block him. "With those soft hands, you haven't have worked a day in your life."

"Okay, okay," she says, starting to get slightly winded, flicking her blade once she stomps him back, "I'll admit that I grew up pretty spoiled. My dad designed yachts for years and we grew up in part by the ocean, and when he got bored of that, he started designing fishing boats, fancying himself a fishermen, even though he barely knows how to hook bait properly." She chuckles and blocks his attacks one-handed, casually talking with her other hand. "Plenty of people fish in the ocean, which is a problem. No one feels they need his designs. So he moved us up here when Dawn entered second grade, so he could design boats for all the people here who take advantage of all the rivers and lakes. He still designs yachts, but now he also designs fishing boats and speedboats, and he sells them to all the big companies around here. He's going to retire early, I'm sure, and since we grew up so well off, we always had a maid for our cleaning and laundry, and I never bothered to learn how to cook. Even now, Dawn does the cooking and baking whenever we're all at the apartment to eat a full meal."

"What a disgrace to the American patriarchal system. Now, how will you ever get a husband if ye can't cook or clean?" he teases. "Tell me you at least learned howtae do laundry once you moved out, or else you're hopeless."

"I can do my laundry, thank you!" Marianne says, and she realizes that they've been fighting harder since they started to banter. "And I know how to clean now, too. But look at you! I doubt you could do work as fine as cooking, either, with those big hands."

"I'll have you know I am a chef, as a matter of fact," he replies. "I could teach you a thing or two about cooking, missy."

"Cooking Lessons with Boggy," she adds playfully, "The King of Haggis and Shephard's Pie."

"Oh-ho, ye'll pay for that one," he tarries long enough to make a few swings for her legs, one successfully knocking her down onto her back on the mat. She falls with an 'oomph!' and he stands over her, angling the end of his staff at her chest. "Haggis is disgusting. I've never cared for it. It's like sausage, but if you left it out for a day and a half, and I could never stomach that they used my sheep's stomachs for it."

"Ew," Marianne knocks his staff away and rolls to the side, throwing her weight to her legs to propel her off the floor and onto her feet again. She brushes back her hair with a hand, and comes straight-on for Bog, batting his blocks like flies until she traps his staff below their chests with one hand and she leans up close to him, lifting her wooden blade to his throat. "I believe that's one-to-one, isn't it?"

His heart skips a beat, and he realizes his mouth is agape after he notices how dry it feels. He clamps his mouth shut and swallows. He disguises it with a smirk. "Seems we're evenly matched."

"Seems so. All this time, and we only got one another down once we started getting sloppy."

"I wasn't getting sloppy, you were just running your mouth, leaving yourself open."

"I wasn't leaving myself open! –And hey, you were talking, too!"

She gives him a little shove in the chest with her sword. He slides his staff to the appropriate length in his hands to poke her belly.

"Easy, Tough Girl. We worked up a sweat. I think we can safely call it a draw."

"I'll get you next time," she says with a narrowed gaze, pointing her sword at his nose. Then she swishes it away and goes over to return it to its rightful slot on the weapon rack. It's just something you say to a foe, but in reality, Marianne genuinely wishes there is a next time.

Bog's eyes shamelessly watch her go, the sway of her hips and the curve of her legs as she bends when she leans down to put her weapon away.

He looks away quickly, face hot both from the exercise and discomfiture, and goes to retrieve his jacket before putting away his own weapon, giving her a chance to move.

When he isn't paying her any mind, Marianne glances over her shoulder to watch him put away his own weapon, giving it a final flip-and-spin around his back and over his elbow before dropping it into place on the rack. Her eyes shamelessly follow the movement in his biceps and drift to the flat plane of his stomach, shifting to the tightness of the ass of his jeans before she quickly looks away and scoops up her jacket.

She feels the rush of blood in her body and can't tell if it's the workout or sudden embarrassment, or… attraction. She shakes it off, because that's just stupid. They're kind of friends? And that's it.

"I'll buy you a water from the vending machine," Bog offers.

"Only if I can buy yours," she replies, and they turn off the lights on their way out, walking side by side.

He snorts. "That about defeats the purpose, doesn't it? We might as well buy our own, then."

"Hmm, fine. I'll permit you to rehydrate me. But only because I don't actually have any cash on me," and she grins.

Their fingers overlap minutely when Bog passes her the cold bottle, and she looks at him to see if he notices, but he doesn't react. He simply lets go and immediately fishes more change from his pocket to put into the machine for his own drink. She fiddles with the wrapper unconsciously, then looks down to crack open the cap and bring the water to her lips. The cool liquid ices her throat and makes her face feel warmer in comparison, but her insides grow calmer.

"Want to do this again next week?" Marianne asks, and she's hoping, praying he says yes.

"This is how you get you kicks, isn't it? Heh. Sure," Bog shrugs, twisting open his own water bottle and taking a long gulp. He wipes his mouth and flashes his teeth. She never notices before, but two of them are chipped, unfixed. "I'm down. Same time, same day?"

She nods. She feels exhilaration light her up from the inside. "See you then."

* * *

 _A/N: The song is 'Moth' by Hellyeah, and it's basically the most Bog song I could have ever hoped to find, even for canon Bog, and it's like the whole basis of this fic. So. Check it out on youtube, yeah?_


	8. Eight: Bar-time Blacks and Blues

For the next several weeks leading up to Thanksgiving, as Jack Frost felt inclined to breeze in and chill every blade of grass and nip every nose, Bog met Marianne once a week at the fitness center on campus and would spar with her, slip in to the yoga class and make up poses with her until they were told to leave, and drop in on the weightlifters to show them up with how much they could lift, including one instance where Marianne hefted up Bog himself over her shoulder and dropped him down onto a bench, sitting straight up.

Bog has never had so much fun with someone before. Oh, they bicker and banter something fierce, and sometimes one of them is silenced by a comeback from the other too good to form a proper rebuttal for, but it's always in jest and well-meaning, and in something dangerously close to flirtation.

And then there had been Halloween. Or, well, near it, at least.

On the Thursday before Halloween, Bog came to school dressed as Beetlejuice in his usual ragged striped suit. Beetlejuice was always one of his favorite films growing up, and he appreciated that even someone hair-brained and unattractive as Beetlejuice could at least make a quirky attempt at getting the girl. Without having even mentioned the film, nor knowing if anyone else would dress up, Bog was pleasantly surprised to see a lot of students at the community college all decked out as zombies, vampires, werewolves, Frankenstein monsters, various slasher flick villains like Freddy, Jason, and Jigsaw, and a plethora of fictional characters and simple things like cheerleaders and gorilla suits.

And one Lydia, in her red wedding gown.

He found her, eager to see who complimented his costume, and if they would notice, if he did a good enough job with styling his hair to stick out at odd ends and what makeup he could splotch onto his face.

When the Lydia girl turned around, it was Marianne peering up at him.

They both couldn't speak for a moment, and when they finally did, it was gestures and sputters of laughter and head shaking and high fiving for similar tastes. What were the chances, honestly?

* * *

Just before Thanksgiving, Marianne goes to go see Sugar Plum at the tattoo parlor. The strange woman is hum-singing a wordless tune while she inks a man's arm, weaving dark blue barbed wire around his biceps. A waste of her creative talent, really. But it's what the client wants.

She waits patiently for the man to be done, and while Plum is cleaning up and the man is paying and admiring his stinging new ink, Marianne drops down into Plum's chair.

"Back for more already?" Sugar Plum remarks with a raised brow of intrigue.

"No, I just wanted you to see how well it's healed up," Marianne beams. "Look!"

She removes layers and yanks her shirt up to her neck, her simple black sports bra leaving her entire shoulder blade exposed for Plum to see.

"My, what a beauty! You skin takes to the colors so well, and it looks mostly smoothed already! Your body approves of art, which is always nice to see," she says cheerfully, affectionately and gently touching her handiwork. "And I'm still so glad to see another primrose tattoo in town. Did you know they're my favorite flower? I wish I could ink them more often." And she sighs.

Marianne tenses, dropping her shirt back down. "Hey, about that!" she says a little heatedly, "Why didn't you mention that you did another primrose tattoo before I got mine?"

"Why would I mention it?" Sugar Plum replies innocently, sweetly. It feels fake. And that falseness is proved when she grins from ear to ear like the Cheshire cat. "It's not like you'd know who the other primrose tattoo belongs to~," and she seems beside herself.

Marianne's jaw drops. She reels back. "He came to see you, didn't he!"

"Oh? Who did?" Plum keeps playing, pretending to tend to some of her supplies.

The brunette is getting beyond annoyed. She hops down off the chair in lieu of stomping a foot. "You've got to be kidding me. What are you up to, S.P.?"

The woman chuckles. "I have a theory," she says in a sing-song voice, "It could be witches~"

Marianne deadpans. "Isn't that the song from the musical episode of Buffy th–"

"No, really, I have a theory," Sugar Plum reiterates, "About matching tattoos. People come in in pairs all the time to get them, and it's cute, a passing fad. Many people aren't very, ah, original… and will get the same types of tattoos over and over. Barbed wire, flames, tigers and claw marks, sleeves that resemble skin being peeled back to reveal muscle or bone or cybernetic wiring. People get family portraits or pets on themselves, and religious symbols or family crests. But some rare, few people who design their own tattoos and happen to have some of the same symbols in them… Well. I call that a modern-day love potion. A red thread of fate, if you will, that brings people together, even before they realize that it's meant to be."

Marianne briefly has a look on her face two steps short of an epiphany, but it quickly fades, and she's left with an expression of cynical doubt. "You're battier than a cave in the Dakotas," she mutters sourly.

"Oh, don't believe me? What flowers do you think most people tattoo on themselves?"

"Roses. Probably a few other symbolic, common flowers, like lilies and tulips and orchids, maybe a lotus or something."

"Precisely. But not many people consider a primrose," she says. "And usually not the pink ones, either. Traditionally they go for the yellow or white. But you and he both chose the pink primrose, the first heartbeat of love."

"Love. Yeah, sure," Marianne scoffs, and puts her sweater and jacket back on. "Like you would have even known when you first put that tattoo on Bog that he'd ever even meet me, or I him! Same town or not. And, like, what if I hadn't picked a primrose? Or if I did, but made it purple or something? Then we wouldn't match. So what of your 'love potion' then?"

"Destiny has a funny way of revealing itself," she muses. "If not you, then someone else would have matched him. Some other kindred spirit who felt and understood things like he does."

Somehow, that statement leaves a bitter taste in Marianne's mouth. She doesn't like thinking of anyone else syncing with Bog in that way. She shivers discreetly, and isn't sure if it's a shudder of disgust at the thought, or a reminder of the cold awaiting her outside.

"I'll see you for my next installment of self-expression," she says with a sigh, turning and waving without looking at Sugar Plum. "See ya."

"Take care, dear," Sugar Plum smiles, and looks up from her cleaning in time to see Marianne snort and mutter something to herself before the shop door shuts behind her.

* * *

"Have you seen Roland lurking anywhere? He left that one letter and it's been a couple months and there's still no sign of him," Marianne frets to Dawn, and Dawn merely shakes her head.

It's Thanksgiving night. The family has left, Dawn is dressed in her khaki and polos, getting ready to do the early Black Friday sale at their place of employment, and Marianne is a little tipsy on red wine, and instead of relaxing her, the buzz opens up her mind to all the concerns she's been shoving down and bottling up for weeks now.

"I'm sorry, Marianne, but… no. Either he's, like, really really good at being a stalker ninja, or he's not in town at all. Maybe he backed off, or he just wanted to intimidate you. I just hope it really was nothing, just… just a reminder or something, and not a threat."

"But he said –"

"That he knows where to find you, yeah. Which is super creepy, but we still don't know what or where he means. So, for now… he hasn't bothered you, right? So hopefully he continues not to. And, who knows? Maybe someone was just playing a prank on you, someone from high school who can copy his handwriting or something. You know how good I am at forging Dad's signature," and she tries to smile, touching her nervous older sister on the shoulder, then frowning and tapping her hand. "No biting."

"Sorry," Marianne mumbles through her teeth, releasing the cuticles of her nails. She has a bad habit of nibbling them off and tearing them until they bleed when she's too anxious over something. Like finals week, or… an ex who won't take the hint and fuck off. "Still, the fact that I haven't seen him scares me. I truly hope it IS just a prank, but if he's actually learning my routine and finding out where I go…"

"That's seriously just too scary. You don't think he'd do that, do you? I mean, he's weird and manipulative and a jerk, but –"

"He was abusive, too," Marianne whispers, looking at the floor. "Mostly verbally, guilt-tripping me into doing or saying things, like agreeing with him or going along with what he wanted to do. And he was my first real relationship and I didn't want to mess it up, so I went along with it, because I didn't know what else I was supposed to do. I thought that was how relationships worked. So once or twice when I tried to voice that I wasn't feeling it, he'd raise his voice at me, sometimes pull back his hand, but always stop, then his face would change and he'd talk really low and try to sweet-talk me instead."

Dawn sits down. Marianne has never told her this before. "So… it wasn't just the cheating," she murmurs. "You beat the snot out of him because… b-because of that, too. Did he ever…?"

"He goaded me into a lot of things," Marianne sighs, falling to sit beside her sister. "Touching my breasts before I was fully okay with it, sticking his hands down my pants before I was fully okay with it… We never had sex, but. He tried to get me to blow him. I avoided that somehow and offered my hand instead, but he wasn't happy about it. In retrospect, the whole week after that he did some pretty petty passive aggressive shit to me for it."

"Marianne… I had no idea," the petit blonde whispers. "Wh-why didn't you tell anyone? Like Dad?"

"…I was embarrassed," Marianne grinds out. "And I was ashamed. I felt dirty and weak, like I couldn't defend myself, and it would only be worse if someone else had to defend me. And I truly thought that those steps were things I had to do, because those are things everyone else was doing, too."

"Oh, Marianne. Haven't movies taught you anything?" Dawn tries to cheer her up, giving her a nudge.

The brunette huffs a laugh without humor in it. "You forget, you were the one watching all those sappy rom-coms that showed both good and bad relationships. I was off watching action and adventure and comic book movies and video game shit like Tomb Raider."

"I know, but…"

"I also don't have the common sense you do," she smiles sadly at Dawn. "At least when it comes to making judgement calls on other people, and relationships. I can do common sense with other things, but not that."

"I guess, but still…"

It's a losing battle to argue the past, and Dawn knows it. She gives up with a fall of her hand to Marianne's back.

"I love you," she reminds, bringing Marianne in for a hug, cradling her upper half to her chest. "And while I wish you would have told me sooner, I'm glad you told me now."

"…Do you think… I have enough grounds to go to the police about a restraining order?"

"Maybe," Dawn murmurs. "But… probably not. You need a lot of proof and reoccurring problems for one of those, I think. Unless you're a rich celebrity that can pay the judge off."

Marianne deflates. "Yeah," she agrees reluctantly. "I just – I wish I was the same person then that I am now. I would have been firm and said no, or never dated him to begin with, or kicked him away, or something. Why was I so blind and naïve?"

"You were young," Dawn says, petting her sister's hair. It's grown out quite a bit, and they've cut it to a very cropped pixie with a longer top to style up at a curve. It's boyish and cute, and shows off Marianne's pierced ears well. "And you were different than you are now; that's how growing up works. It's okay to forgive yourself for that."

Marianne's eyes fill with tears and she turns her face into her sister's lap. "Since when did you start mothering me?"

"I always have," Dawn smiles tenderly, "You've just never noticed."

* * *

With Thanksgiving break in full swing and the holiday itself passed, the weekend is Marianne's to fill with leftover food and all the alcohol she wants.

She goes to the King's Castle, eager to celebrate the beautiful time of year with frost on colorful fallen leaves, warm food, good, crisp smells outside with cozy, spicy smells inside, and all the bundles of layers to hide herself that she wants. It's bliss.

She also wants to get out her aggressions and pleasures and freedoms before the crackdown on finals come early December, followed then by the relief of the month-long break between semesters.

Marianne takes a taxi, planning full-well to get smashed. She also can't take her bike because it's too cold, and her car is in use for Sunny and Dawn tonight as they both close at work. The brunette is left to herself, and what a thrill it is.

She also has her knife on her, and a tiny can of pepper spray keychained to it.

Entering the bar, Marianne is greeted with sights and smells that feel like home. She waves and grins at some of the regulars she recognizes, like Pare, and she hums to herself as she sits down. Griselda is bartending again, and really, she always has this shift, so Marianne isn't surprised. It's a rare day when Griselda doesn't bartend late nights, and even rarer that the woman has a cold or something.

"Mari, love! Did you have a good Thanksgiving? Lots of food?"

"I'm positive I gained ten pounds in stuffing and cranberry sauce on biscuits alone. Dawn makes a mean cranberry sauce. Can I get one of your Things for Wild Things?"

"Coming right up!" Griselda chirps, ecstatic. She gets to work and "So, any good gossip? Maybe a man in your life?"

Marianne blushes suddenly, and she doesn't want to think why. "No gossip, and… I don't know? I've made really good friends with someone from school. Actually, we're really similar, we have a lot of the same interests and hobbies and stuff, and both have the same sentiments on mushy-gushy love," and her lips pull up at the corners without conscious thought. Just thinking about Bog puts her in a good mood.

"Sounds like you've got a crush," Griselda sighs. She's disappointed to hear it; she'd hoped one of these days that Marianne stopped in, she could somehow trick her son into coming out and stumbling across her, maybe hitting it off and buying her a drink. She's fantasized this happy little scenario a few times, always just moments away from going back into the kitchen to drag him out, but each and every time, something else has gotten her attention and she's forgotten to do it. And now she seems to have missed her matchmaking window. She serves Marianne her specialty drink.

"O-oh, jeez, I-I don't think so," Marianne stutters, a nervous laugh bubbling up from her throat as she peers down at her glass, taking it into her hand.

Before Griselda can say anything in response, a man with wavy blond hair and chiseled jaw with toothpaste-ad pearly whites beaming below his grassy green eyes comes sliding in, leaning his arm into the bar counter right beside Marianne's favorite stool. His body blocks her only exit, his other arm pressed against the pillar to her left. The pillar that ends the bar to make an archway that leads to the kitchen entrance.

"Hullo, darlin'," the man purrs, and Marianne's blood runs cold.

She was already startled to have a body damn near flush to her right side, and the gold and green in her peripherals was setting off alarm bells enough, but the voice… it chills her with dread and bad memories suddenly fresh enough to aggravate old wounds. She thought she had closure Thanksgiving night, speaking to Dawn. But instead, she's shaking as it's reopened all over again.

"Roland," the brunette breathes, and in the split second it takes her to snap out of her initial shock and turn to seize him with a glower so profound it could snuff out a light, reaching for her tiny blade and the pepper spray on it to spritz in his eyes, Roland's charming façade shatters, his smirk turning dark, and he grabs her wrist.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you, Buttercup."

Griselda shrieks, more out of anger than fear, and snaps her cleaning rag at his shoulder. "Unhand her, you rotten blighter! Just who d'you think you are, coming into my bar and harassin' my favorite regular?"

"Hold your horses, old hag," Roland sneers, shooting a glare Grissy's way. "Me and this belle got some unfinished business from back in the day to settle. You stay out of it."

"Who does that make you, Gaston?" Marianne spits in his face, knowing full well he meant a 'belle' as in a 'beauty', but she couldn't resist. He's egotistical scum in the same way as the Disney villain himself. "Get the fuck away from me!"

It takes the quickest of movements, but Marianne kicks off against the wall beneath the bar and sends her stool sliding and then careering backward, falling over. She tucks and rolls, and the speed of it all knocks her from Roland's grip. The other bar attendants stop their games of pool and darts and break up their crowds around the tables and jukebox to turn and look at the scene. Some turn away again straightaway, but others whistle lowly and wait for what happens next.

Marianne surveys her surroundings. Her knife and pepper spray went flying, and it takes her a second to locate them; they slid halfway across the bar toward the entrance, quite out of reach, and between some booted feet. She gets up from her stretched crouch, only to find three men closing in on her.

"Like my frat brothers?" Roland smiles, gesturing to the men. "They said they'd help me out with getting my girl back. Fraternities stick together, you know. For life."

All at once, Marianne is assaulted by the three, all stocky and tall, possibly football players. She kicks and screams, and her yell nearly drowns out Griselda's yell while the bartender races toward the back of the bar, into the kitchen.

Marianne struggles with all her might, but her body is straining with the effort against the bulk and strength of three men. They're too heavy and unyielding, like dense old trees. She keeps trying to throw her weight, though, hoping her erratic abdomen, hip, and leg movements wriggle her free from at least one of them.

Roland closes it and goes to cup her cheek. She turns and clicks her teeth to bite him, misses.

"Oh! My li'l snappin' turtle," Roland chuckles. "There, there. Calm down, wouldja? I'm not here ta hurt ya. You know that all I want is yer love, darlin'."

"Go suck a dick! Why the fuck are you so hung up on me, anyway? You're fucking pathetic. No woman deserves a piece of shit like you. You can dress yourself up like a model all you want, but inside you're nothing but manipulative, materialistic, narcissistic asshole who doesn't even know what love is!" she snarls, and she watches in horror as Roland's face contorts into something wicked she's never seen in all the time she's known him.

"I came to save you from this dump of a town, and this is how you repay me?" he says lowly, his Southern twang hot and tangible as he gets up close, barely a breath away from her nose. "Well, sugar, if I can't have your pretty face… no one will."

He grabs an empty bottle from the unbussed table nearby, gripping it by the neck and smashing its bottom against the table itself. Brown shards fly everywhere, and Marianne looks down reflectively, squeezing her lids shut to avoid a piece hitting her in the eye.

Behind her lids, in the dim of her mind, she holds her breath and flinches as far down as she can go, trying to escape, trying to brace for impact, trying to remember what her own face looks like before it's torn wide open. She sees a grim flash of the future – shredded flesh, skin peeled back, muscle of her cheek red and wet, the bone of her brow peeking through the blood. Maybe she loses her eye. Maybe a chuck of the bridge of her nose or the side of her nostril is stripped away. Maybe –

"Whoa, Roll, we didn't agree to let you mutila–" one of the three footballers gripping her starts to say, but Roland shoots him a nasty look that makes him clamp his mouth shut.

Roland hoists the jagged bottle into the air.


	9. Nine: Fight or Flight

Griselda weaves through the kitchen. Goddammit, it's not very large! Where the fuck is her son when she needs him? These other thugs back here are too gelatinous and sluggish to be of much help. Like Brutus; he's bulky, but he's good at eating, not fighting. She growls and grabs Thomas – the fellas call him Thang – by the scruff of his collar, demanding, "Where's m'boy!"

"H-he's around back, ma'am," he replies shakily, and she releases him.

Griselda isn't as fast as she used to be. She waddles as quickly as her legs can carry her, her hip shouting its protest. But fuck her arthritis, there's a girl who needs help.

She comes bursting out the back metal door, into the alleyway. Bog is there, loading the trash and sneaking a cigarette. She comes right up to him, reaching up to snatch his cig away.

"Mum!" he jerks, startled. She stomps out the cancer stick and shakes her fist at him. He starts to say, "Hey, look, that was my first one since I quit. I was just –"

"I dinnae give a flying crap" – and she rolls her R into nearly an L, she's so furious – "aboot your habits! You march into the bar right nao and stop a fight!"

"Aw, Mum," Bog gripes, shoving his hands into his pocket, fingering the lighter within. He's jonesing so bad right now, he barely had half, and he wants to smoke the rest. "Just yell at 'em to take it outside, they always do. They're just dumb and drunk."

"This isn't some normal bar scrap, boy!" She snaps. "Some fucker came in and is harassing one of me favorite girls! Kick his ass!"

"What d'I care about some girl? Call the police, let them handle it," Bog mutters. He doesn't have time to play hero. His break is almost over.

Griselda slaps him across the face. It smarts, but it's more to knock sense into him than to hurt him. "You stubborn, selfish man. Since when did I raise such apathy? I've always taught you right, to treat women well and protect them. Now you git yer arse in there right now and save poor Marianne!"

A wave of ice washes down from the top of his head to pool in his stomach. It stiffens his joints, stills his idly movements. "…Marianne…?"

"Yes! What are ye, deaf? Marianne! She's the regular I'm always tellin' you about, thae you ne'er list–" she fumes. She doesn't even finish the sentence when Bog suddenly takes off. He shoves past his mother and rushes around front, not time to unlock the back door. Griselda watches him go, baffled, and tries her best to limp-jog after him.

Bog bursts in through the front entrance and sees them there. He kicks something, stoops, and scoops it up. A knife, with a small purple can of spray. He doesn't even ask to have to know who this belongs to; he's seen it on Marianne's bike keys. He tightens his grip on it and storms over to the group of men restraining Marianne.

One of them starts to protest mutilation, right as the blond in front of him raises a broken bottle in the air, its uneven edges catching in the dim light.

With a roar, Bog swoops in between the blond and Marianne and stops the blond's hand by the wrist with an iron grip.

"Eugh!" Roland grimaces, staring right up into Bog's face. "Who brought life to this gargoyle?"

"Don't you dare lay a finger on her!" Bog shouts crossly at Roland with all the venom of a thousand Egyptian asps.

Roland fully intends to give a reply, but it's extinguished before it can flare up as Bog delivers a swift blow to Roland's stomach with his bony knee, crippling Roland to a limp noodle in his grip. He drops Roland to the ground, the bottle rolling from Roland's fingers. One of the men holding Marianne lets her go in favor of attacking Bog to avenge his fraternity brother.

Bog swings his leg 'round and kicks him, but is soon tackled to the ground after a brief stumble backward. He struggles beneath the man's weight while Marianne flares into high gear, still shocked she never felt the blow, still shocked Bog is here, having come to her rescue somehow, and still too disoriented to notice Griselda walking in, yelping and hurrying to a phone to get the police like her son suggested.

There is chaos on the floor; some of the other people at the bar started to file out the other entrance, some gathering around in a circle to cheer on the violence.

Bog flicks open Marianne's knife and slashes at the stocky man's shirt. It grazes his skin, certainly tears open his shirt. He backs off to inspect for blood. There's some, but no torn tissue.

Marianne is fending better for herself with only two men on her. She elbows one, kicks the other, Loosens the grip of one of her arms. She goes for the eyes of the closest of her captors, clawing with her fingernails, digging deep enough to scratch his eye and rake some of the top layers of his skin under her nails. He howls and covers his face with his hands, backing off to stumble into a chair and knock it over, seated on the ground, writhing in pain.

The other guy is now vulnerable to Marianne's attacks, and she calls out, "Bog! Spray!" and he doesn't think twice, just tosses it to her.

She magically manages to catch it, just barely, by the knife. She hisses, it slicing between her thumb and forefinger, but she turns it around with messy, bloody fingers and opens the cap to spray the pepper at the third thug's face. He raises up his arms and tries to hide from it, but she's too fast, turning to his side and aiming it just right.

He's screaming now, too, and Bog has the cut one down for the count, the guy pleading to be let go.

Then Roland crops up, coming up behind Bog and twisting his arm around his back, pinning it there. The broken bottle is back in Roland's hand, and he has it pointed to Bog's throat. Bog goes still.

"Whoa there, Marianne. You want me to spill blood in your name that isn't yours?" Roland says, sounding like he's cracking, getting a bit desperate, crazed.

Marianne slowly turns with wide eyes.

"Get somewhere safe, Marianne!" Bog yells to her, his Adam's apple bobbing against the spark points of the glass. One pokes him, a thin trail of blood trickling down his neck to touch his collarbone. It feels itchy and warm, like a bad nick while shaving.

"Are you joking? I would never just leave you here!" the brunette tosses back, and she holds out her knife with her wounded hand. "Roland, you let him go, or I swear to God…"

"Oh, so you two know each other? Augh, and the way you're declaring for the other to be safe –disgusting… you actually have feelings for this cattail weed?" He cackles, pushing the bottle a tad deeper into Bog's throat. It makes a second dribble of blood follow the path of the first from the same wound, stretching it. "Interesting, but come on, sweetheart. You could do loads better."

"Shut your fucking mouth!" Marianne threatens as she takes a step closer, and Roland retreats back one to match. She's trembling with rage. "Bog is loads better. Compared to your psychotic ass, Bog is everything a good partner should be. He's got my back. He gets my humor. He rides like me and spars with me and listens to the same kind of music I do. He likes the same movies, he thinks of the same costume and tattoos, he is the best friend I've ever made and kept, and you only wish you were an eight as good a person as he is!"

The small remaining crowd Oooohs at the insulting speech.

Roland is visibly shaken. Panicked, hurt. He lowers the bottle from Bog's neck, gaping at her.

Then he tosses the bottle down and charges for it, his arms outstretched, fingers headed directly for her thin throat.

Bog tears after him, yanking him back to sprawl down on his back before he can reach and potentially strangle Marianne. His head hits the floor with a heavy thud.

Sirens and flashing blues and reds suddenly pull in to the bar parking lot, shining through the blinds in the windows up front.

The three frat boys huddle together and kick their wounds, and Roland lies unconscious at Bog's feet.

Bog steps over him to Marianne. "Are you all right?"

She's holding her hand, finally feeling the full burning brunt of the pain. "I'll live. Are you okay?" she asks more softly, peering at his throat, and a bump on his head he picked up somewhere along the way.

He touches the tender spot on his brow, already beginning to swell, and then touches a fingertip to the cut in his neck. It's still bleeding. He shrugs one shoulder. "…I'll live. Want to leave before the authorities come rushing in?"

"Shouldn't we stay and tell them it was self-defense? Because it was."

"My mother can handle it. She's the one who called. She can tell them I took you to the hospital. Which I am," he insists, and holds out his unbloodied hand.

She takes it in her own unbloodied one, tucking her knife and spray away. "Lead the way."

* * *

Bog's jeep is as rugged as he is, and just as reliable. He opens her door for her, lets her scoot inside while she holds a handkerchief from Bog's pocket to her hand. He has a scarf of hers wrapped around his neck. He piles in, starts the engine, lets it heat up a second.

Music starts up from his CD player, and he turns it down to nearly mute levels.

"…What was that all about?" Bog wants to know.

"You work at the bar?" Marianne deflects clumsily.

He sighs, knowing she won't tell him until she's ready. He runs a hand through his hair, then turns the knob up for the heater. "Aye. That chef job I mentioned before… this is where it is. I used to 'tend, but my temper wasn't, ah, conducive to customer service."

"Wait… From what Griselda's told me, are you -?"

"She's me mum, yeah," he confirms.

"Oh, wow," she huffs a laugh, "First Plum, and now Grissy. Ha, haha… this is too much… hahahahahaa," and she starts to hyperventilate.

Bog panics for a moment, turning and hesitating to touch her. He places his hand on her back and gently leans her forward, rubbing in small circles. She starts to hiccup, then fall into relieved sobs.

"I… really thought… he might… kill me," she breathes out between inhales, and presses her forehead to her wrists. Bog tries to twist toward her, but is hindered by the vehicle. He grunts, his seat already back as far as it will go on its track. He gets out of the car and comes around the front, opening Marianne's door and wrapping his arms around her.

She slowly calms her breath, her tears ceasing in increments. She brings her uninjured hand up to reciprocate the embrace as best she can by touching Bog's forearm.

"…I knew Roland could be… one-track-minded… but I never thought he would go this far," Marianne says quietly. "I got as letter a couple months back… but I didn't think… I didn't know…" She heaves a shaky sigh. "God, I feel so unprepared and weak, all over again."

"You aren't weak," Bog answers softly. "You're the strongest person I know, next to my mother." He presses his mouth and cheek against her hair, but doesn't kiss her. He pulls his lips up to speak. "What did the letter say?"

"Not much," Marianne whispers, "Just that he's back in town and knows where to find me, and couldn't wait to see me. And after that, nothing was different. I got paranoid after a while, bought the pepper spray to go with my knife, afraid he might be stalking me and would come out of an alley somewhere – but he never did."

"…Have you been traveling alone these past few months?"

She lifts her head, considers it. She blinks. "Only to school, and when I got my tattoo. Every other time I had Dawn or Sunny with me, they just went into a different shop and let me do my thing elsewhere."

"So you still had a traveling companion. But tonight, they weren't with you," Bog clarifies, and his tone is grave.

Her eyes widen. "He… he was waiting for the right moment? All this time? W… watching me?"

"He must have been. And tonight, how did you get here?"

"…I took a taxi. Dawn and Sunny both work late tonight, since it's the day after Black Friday, and the store is a mess," she utters, and blinks hard, looking Bog in the eye. "I was lucky to get the night off. I wanted to get drunk."

"The perfect time to pounce. You're utterly alone, with no one to come to your aid, and possibly plastered by the time he shows his face."

Marianne feels sick. She feels really, truly sick. It doesn't help that she hasn't eaten anything. "Move… move…"

She weakly shoves him back by the chest, and places her hands on her knees as she bends forward and dry-heaves out the jeep door, toward the pavement. Not much comes out, and she covers her mouth. The handkerchief falls.

Bog picks it up, rubs her back again. She inhales and exhales shallowly, then as she sits back up, her inhale is long and her exhale is slow and measured. She's done crying, and the nausea has passed. She looks up at Bog, whom looks out of his element, and bless him, he's really trying his best to be here for her.

She gives him a lopsided smile. "I'm sorry I'm being so pathetic. I'm usually got it pretty together, and then I go and act like this."

"Oh, Tough Girl," he consoles, "You're not pathetic. You're acting human."

She sniffs, looks away. She dabs at her moist eyes. "…Can we head to the hospital, now? My hand is killing me."

* * *

All bandaged and stitched up on both ends, and Marianne's insurance still under her father until she's twenty-four, thank God, almost entirely pays for the emergency room visit. They ask Marianne if she would like to stay, concerned looks on their faces from her demeanor. But she waves it away and says it's better if she goes home and rests.

Exiting the hospital, Bog takes a call he missed form his mother.

…Make that fourteen calls from his mother.

His tone is exasperated as he responds to every question. "Yes, Mum, we're all right. Yes, yes, we're just leaving the hospital now. –No, I'm not driving and on the phone at the same time! –Yes, sorry, I'm sorry you had to deal with the police – yeah, I'll answer their questions tomorrow. Huh? Oh, Marianne? She's… holding up okay, yeah. You want – want to speak to her? Really? Hn… okay," he sighs. He holds the phone out across the cup holders between the front seats. "Reassure her, please. She won't stop squawking in my ear."

Marianne smiles meekly and takes the phone. "Hello, Grissy."

"Marianne! Oh, sweetie, it's so good to hear your voice again. I was so scared for you, and I'm so glad you're all right. Is my son treating you well? He damn better be. I know you only know him from what I've complained about, but –"

"No, Griselda, he's actually my friend. He's… the guy from school I was talking about, actually," she admits, and if she weren't so exhausted, she might have felt embarrassed. As it stands, she doesn't. "Heh… I'm surprised you didn't hear what I was saying to Roland about him."

"I was phoning the police, and the bar was chaos. You expect me to have heard?" Griselda puzzles, then starts laughing; more with relief than making fun. "Oh, Lord… All this time, you two knew each other. I can't believe it. I'm just so glad you're both all right." She sounds tearful; after all the adrenaline and madness of tonight, it's no wonder everyone's emotions seem to be on the fritz; including Marianne's own. Bog seems to be the only one keeping it together, but the brunette senses it's all a ruse. "Well, I'll let you go. The sooner I do, the sooner we can all be in one place again. Goodbye, dearie. And give my love to my son. See you soon."

The call ended, and Marianne handed the phone back.

"Your mother sends her love."

"She always does," Bog says, and there's a hint of a smile in his tone.

* * *

Silence fills most of the ride back into downtown. Marianne isn't wearing her seatbelt; she has her hands linked under her knees, both legs drawn up as close to her chest as they will go. She looks so small and frail in her current position, and between stop lights, Bog glances at her.

"You know, I've had my fair share of bad relationships," Bog begins. He's reluctant to tell the story, but by the looks of it, Marianne needs this one. He clears his throat. "I didn't have anyone throughout high school here. The few chums I had I lost quickly, and no girl looked my way. Lotta girls avoided me, pretended I wasn't there. I never went to any of the dances; there was no point. Who would I go for? Not my friends; they were shallow at best, only good'fer talking to at school. People'd joke about my accent, some'd claim it wasn't real, and nobody liked how tall an' awkward I was. Am.

"And… come my first try 'round at uni, I met a girl. She was maybe a bit heavyset, but she was sweet. She didn't avoid me, acknowledged I was there." He swallows. "She… was very lovely. She always smelled fresh and floral, always wore her hair in low pigtails. She had the smallest feet and hands, compared to the rest of her. She said she liked me. She asked me to a party, and we went out for a bit. Then she broke it off, and I was heartbroken. I couldn't figure why. I took her out, bought her things, and answered her calls and texts, made a few to her myself. I remembered our one-month, got her flowers that matched the scent she always wore. Took me a little while to get over it enough to ask her why she didn't want me. She… s-she said, 'I only agreed t-to go out with you b-because I felt bad for you.'"

Marianne look at him then, feels the hurt in his voice, doesn't miss the sounds he stutters. She drops one knee, foot back on the floor of the car. She grips the remaining lifted knee with both hands. Not knowing what to say, she manages, "That bitch."

Bog rums his fingers on the steering wheel. He refuses to look anywhere but the road while he tells his stories.

"There was one other woman after her. In me mid-twenties, I met the most beautiful girl I'd ever seen upta that point. She had flaming red hair and freckles all over her skin, and her eyes were pools of the sky. I can't believe she'd even look my way, let alone speak to me. But she laughed at my jokes and let me buy her coffee, and we go on well. She humored me for three months. Then she came to me with her eyes big and watery and took me by the hand and told me in her sweet voice, 'James, I'm sorry, but I've fallen in love with someone else. I've been cheating on you for over a month. I'm so sorry.' And I realized then that she never loved me to begin with, if it was that easy. I was just a placeholder, and that's all I'd ever be. Just a stepping stone. And I swore from then on to never be someone's stepping stone again."

Marianne drops the other leg, turns in her seat. She reaches out and touches his shoulder, lightly, then gives it a squeeze. "I never wanted to be tricked and used and cheated on again. That's why I hate love. People say it too carelessly, and use our feelings against us. I know we talked about how stupid Valentine's Day is before, during one of our spars, but… That's why, for me. Roland… damaged me."

"Well, I'm damaged, too," Bog says, and she can't figure out his tone. She runs her hand down his arm, laces her fingers between his on the steering wheel. He removes his hand, steering single-handed, and turns his palm over to hold her hand properly.

"I can't believe those girls. I want to give them dental records like Canadian hockey players," she hisses, giving his hand a gentle squeeze. "They don't deserve you, anyway. You're too good for filth like that. How could someone do that to a person?"

"How, indeed? I don't know what Roland did to you before – and you never have to tell me if you dinnae want to – but from what I saw tonight… You should have never even been exposed to such bottom-feeding scum of the world like him."

They fall quiet. Their hands remind laced together all the way back to an apartment building. It isn't until Bog takes his hand back to put the jeep into park and shuts off the engine that Marianne looks up. "…Where are we?"

"…Oh," Bog murmurs absentmindedly. "I… just automatically drove home, I-I wasn't thinking. I'm sorry," he says, starting the car back up again. "Buckle up, and I'll drive you home, if you be my GPS."

"No, I…" she stops. Should she? Is it wrong is she does? But… she doesn't want to be alone tonight. Dawn and Sunny should be back from work by now, if not soon, but – it's a different kind of loneliness she feels. Only someone who just went through the bar fight she did could understand. "C-can I… stay here tonight?"

Bog does a double-take. "A-are you sure? I really can drive you home, it's no trouble – a-and it's not like… I wasn't planning to – I just sort of…"

"No, I know," she says, smiling to reassure him. "You're not the type of person to pull a manipulation like that. Only Roland would stoop so low, and use it to try and sleep with me. I trust you. And I just – need a friend right now. Someone who gets it, 'cause… 'cause they were there."

"Oh," Bog says, relieved. "Good. I mean, I get it. I… Me, too. Aye, I can do that. Let's…" He shuts off the engine once more, unbuckles. "Let's go inside."

He gets out of the car, and Marianne follows suit. He locks it, and she follows him up to his floor, waits for him to unlock the door.

Inside, his flat is small, merely a studio. There is a partial wall dividing the bedroom from the living room/kitchen area, and little furniture, some of it clearly cheap, something easy to put together. A long-haired black cat comes traipsing in, going up to Bog and rubbing its head against his leg, meowing.

"Yeah, yeah, Bones, I know you're hungry. Sorry I'm late, but you won't believe the shit I've been through."

He picks up the cat and flips him over onto his back, cradling him like an infant in his arm, rubbing his belly and chest with his free hand. The cat closes its eyes, craning its neck back for scratches. Marianne giggles.

"I completely forgot you bought cat food that day I saw you at my work. And all the alcohol, in retrospect, was probably for the bar?"

"Yes'm," he mumbles, tired, and sets his cat down. He shuts the door, locks the apartment. Then he goes about getting a cat of food out and popping it out onto a plate, mushing it to spread it around before setting it on the floor for his pet. "I'd offer you me bed, but I don't know when I last cleaned the sheets," he says sheepishly. "I have clean blankets in a closet, though. I can make up the couch for you."

"Thanks," Marianne says, and jerks her thumb. "Is your bathroom connected to the bedroom?"

He nods. "Just go 'round the wall and you'll see it across from the bed."

His bed lies under the window, and sure enough, there's a tiny bathroom with a shower stall, sink, and toilet all crammed into one barely-rectangular space. It's cleaner than she thought it would be for a bachelor, and his toothbrush, she notes, is green.

Because of some of their discussions in art class, she recalls that his favorite color is green, although more within the mossy and olive hues than this mint-leaf color, but it makes her smile nonetheless.

She splashes her face with cold water, and uses a folded wad of toilet paper and some hand soap to remove what little she has left on her face of her makeup. It's time for raccoon eyes, and she does her best to make it at least marginally darker than her natural skin color, as opposed to the smudged purple and blue it was before.

All clean and feeling a bit more refreshed, she sips some of the water from the sink before she turns it off. She wishes she had a change of clothes; she can feel the bar and hospital grime. Not to mention the blood – her blood – spattered on her jeans.

There's a knock at the door.

"Uh, Marianne?"

"Hmm?"

"If… if you want me to wash your clothes, you can wear some of mine. They'd be big, but – but clean."

She opens the door, and he's holding up some basketball shorts and a white cotton tee. Despite his thin frame, the shirt is large – most likely for his shoulders and the length – and the shorts are mediums. But they'll do.

"Thank you. And… you have in-unit laundry?" she frowns, surprised. This place doesn't look big enough for that…

"No, but I have a small portable washer I bought online that, uh, y-you hook up to the sink for water, and- and press the pedal to work it, and I usually hang everything up to dry."

He seems nervous. What is the last time he's had a woman in his apartment? Has it really been since the ginger girl he mentioned? Or did she ever even come over? Marianne secretly, selfishly wishes she's the first.

"That's great! I can help spot-treat them, see if they're salvageable, or if my blood ruined it all," she says, looking down at herself. She brings her eyes back to his and takes the proffered clothing. "Thank you so much, Bog, really. I'll be back out in a sec, okay?"

He nods, and she shuts the door.

Keeping her bra and underwear on, she changes into his clothes. The shorts rest just fine on her hips, but the shirt is so baggy it makes her wee arms stick out like Popsicle sticks from the swathes of a paper towel. The clothes smell like fresh, airy linen, and vaguely of Bog.

His whole apartment smells like him, really. It doesn't smell like litterbox, despite her having seen it right there in the kitchen, and it doesn't smell as musty or stale as she thought someplace this small in an older building such as this would smell. It's somehow familiar, comfortable.

She yawns.

Emerging from the bathroom with a wad of soiled clothes, she finds Bog in the kitchen with his tiny clothes washer. It's compact and cute, and as he shows her how it works, she marvels at its convenience.

Soon, the couch is made up and she snuggles down into it, and Bog gives her a warm glance and a wave goodnight before he goes into his bedroom. He has no door, just an open cut that isn't quite an archway, and she can vaguely see his feet at the edge of the bed when he's laid down.

She closes her eyes. Normally, falling asleep at a friend's house for the first time makes for restlessness and nightmares and that semi-waking confusion of 'Where am I? This isn't my room,' between dream states, but not tonight.

Tonight, Marianne falls asleep easily and has dim, vaguely peaceful dreams, and she hardly wakes or stirs even once all night.


	10. Ten: Close Encounters

Marianne wakes groggy and with a full-body ache, the tension finally revealing itself, but otherwise… calmed. She goes to check her phone to see what time it is.

…And the battery is long dead.

Getting up clumsily and fishing with sleepy hands and a yawn that temporarily renders her sight on touch-sensation only, she locates her phone charger in her jacket pocket and scrambles to find an outlet.

The one closest to her is just off to the side of the couch. She plug it in, connects her phone, and plops back onto the sofa to wait for it to boot up.

It's nine eighteen in the morning, and she has five missed calls and about twenty text messages, all from Dawn, asking where she is and if she's okay and oh my god, if this is a murderer who took her sister's phone, they are in for a world of hurt.

Marianne chuckles dryly, her throat parched and mouth tasting stale. She removes the notices for the calls, scrolls down every text, then gets up to go make a phone call in the hallway, so not to wake her friend.

Sticking her shoe in the doorway so she doesn't get locked out, Marianne paces down the hall and hears the phone get picked up on the second ring.

"Marianne!" Dawn bellows, and Marianne pulls her phone away from her ear, wincing. "Oh my god! What the fuck? Where are you right now?"

"Please don't cuss, Dawn, it doesn't suit your adorable personality," the brunette retorts, starting to smile. God, it's a blessing she can hear her sister's voice. It feels like weeks have passed within a single night.

"Don't you lecture me, you potty-mouthed sailor! Now come, on, spill it. What's going on?"

"Roland came by the bar last night, tried to get the jump on me with three frat boy goons of his," she confesses, trying to come off like it was a huge inconvenience and not nearly a third of the terror it actually was. Put up a front, keeping things from her sister… again. Marianne tries not to think about why she's back to this. "He's been stalking me for sure, Dawn. Waiting until we weren't have a group outing or I wasn't out during the day, the perfect time to get me. But I fought him off, him and his goons. Even when I thought they'd gotten the best of me, Bog came in and saved the day. Turns out he works at the bar; who knew?"

"Whoa whoa whoa!" Dawn replies, and even over the phone, Marianne can picture her waving her hands about. "Hold on. Back up. Bog works at your favorite bar by some coincidence, Roland sunk to new lows I didn't even think were possible, and you're acting all blasé about this?"

"Well… how am I supposed to act? We fixed it. Griselda – Bog's mother, can you believe it? – called the cops, and later today Bog and I have to go in for questioning about it, but it was all self-defense so I think we'll be okay."

"Why didn't you get questioned there? After the brawl went down?"

"Because Bog had to take us to the hospital –"

"YOU WERE IN THE HOSPITAL!" Dawn cries, making Marianne hold the phone out to arm's length this time. "Why didn't they call me! Wh –"

"You're my sister and roommate, not Dad. I'm a legal adult, they on't bother contacting anyone as long as I'm conscious. Which I was."

"Still…" Dawn murmurs.

"I know," Marianne softens, sighing. "Just don't worry, okay? I'm at Bog's place right now. He let me stay the night 'cause I asked him if I could. – And no, for the love of God, we didn't sleep together, before you fucking ask."

"…I wasn't going to ask. Or even suggest it," Dawn replies, and for once, Marianne can't tell if she's bluffing or sincere.

Marianne sighs. Maybe Dawn is being sincere, and she's just paranoid at this point. Maybe she's voicing secret whims. She can't be sure in her current state, both as recently awoken and still a bit distraught from the night's events. "Anyway, I'll be home after breakfast, and I'm going to call in today. I'm pretty sure even the manager would understand that a crazy ex attacking me and me having to go to a hospital and later talk to the police are all totally fair grounds to not come in."

"I'll say. Jesus Christ."

"Don't put the Lord's name in vain, either. It also doesn't suit you."

"…Shut up, Marianne." She laughs. "God, I'm so glad you'll all right. Give Boggy a suuuuuper big hug and smooch on the cheek for me, okay? He needs to know how grateful I am that he's there to protect my dumb older sister who keeps getting herself into trouble."

The brunette laughs, too. "I'll be sure he gets the message."

* * *

Back inside the flat, Marianne touches her clothes on the drying rack. They're mostly dry, so she picks them up. She glances in the direction of Bog's room; does she dare tip-toe in and slip into the bathroom to shower? She already has to pee and either way she'll need to change in there, but… is it rude to just use someone's shower without asking? She doesn't know, she's never had to ask before when over at someone's house. She's either left sleepovers in the morning in her PJs to go shower at home, or her friends told her she could go use it.

Nibbling her lip, she starts to make her way into Bog's room, headed for the bathroom.

He inhales suddenly with a small snort, startled by the tiniest noise, and rolls over from his back to his side, peeking an eye open at her.

"Um…" she freezes in her tracks, pointing to the bathroom. "Can I… shower?"

"'Course," he grunts, his voice slurring with the rasp of sleep. His cat enters at the sound of his voice, jumping up onto the bed with a soft landing, crawling on top of Bog and nuzzling under his chin. He shuts his eyes again as he rolls onto his stomach, gently shoving the cat away, and folds his arms underneath his pillow, the sheets tangling around his waist. His shirt is hefted up a bit, twisted, and she can see his lower back. Marianne tries not to let her eyes linger, purposely turning away to head into the bathroom and shut the door.

Bog's bathroom is barely maneuverable. The toilet is right beside the shower stall, and the sink is practically in the doorway. The mirror is a cracked around one of its screws in the corner, and the shower stall looks clean but with a couple age stains up below the showerhead. She strips out of Bog's clothes and steps inside after flushing the toilet.

She regrets it, because with the water already on, the flush makes the water nearly scald her, and she jumps back, bumping into the tile wall, her elbow smartly hitting the bubbled glass door.

"You okay?" Comes Bog's voice, a yell from his bed and through the door.

"I'm fine!" she calls back, heat rising to her cheeks. "God, Bog," she says loudly, "How do you even fit in here? It's so cramped, and I'm, like, half your height!"

She hears the bed creak as he must be getting up. "I walk in my knees," he quips, and it makes her laugh while she borrows his shampoo.

She can't shave her legs, and she rubs them together, feeling the grit of stubble. Well, at least she was wearing long pants. She cleans up and borrows some body wash in her hands that smells spicy and clean, and washes away the sweat and stress and overall grunge of the previous day. Some of the soap seeps through her bandage and stings her hand, and she hisses in pain. She suffers through it, though.

Out of the shower, Marianne snags a faded blue towel and dabs herself off, helps herself to some of Bog's unscented lotion. Everything in his apartment is so very neutral; the taupe walls, the brown sofa and wood grain furniture, the cream and odd-white lamps and lightbulbs, the olive rug in the kitchen. It's very simple, vaguely earthy. Even the products he buys aren't overly masculine in scent or feminine, either. It's different.

Emerging in her clean clothes, still rubbing her head to towel off her short hair, Marianne frees up the bathroom. The only problem was still wearing her same underwear.

"I wasn't sure what to do with the clothes I borrowed, so I just left them on the floor. I hope that's okay?"

"Yeah, I'll get them later," Bog replies. She steps into the kitchen and he's starting up a percolator for coffee.

She smiles, amused. "What, no Keurig?"

He snorts. "I like having more than one cup at a time, thanks. And percolated coffee is amazing, just you wait. If you control the brewing right, it doesn't get any less flavorful, and it's the hottest coffee you'll ever get, and the most robust, too."

"I trust your judgement," she smiles, taking a seat at the short breakfast bar on its single stool. She shakes her towel gently. "Now, what do I do with this?"

He takes it from her, goes and tosses it in the bathroom as well. "I'll get it later, too."

When bog returns, he leans against the counter near the percolator kettle, picking dirt out from under his nails. It's quiet for a bit, just the sizzle and crackle of coffee being made. Marianne glances over at her phone, still charging. She admires the one painting in the abode, a lush forest painting hanging above the couch.

"Is that any particular forest?" she asks lamely.

Bog peers over at it. "I don't think so. But it reminds me of some of the ones in Scotland I'd explore as a child. It also feels dark and mysterious, like a forest for faerie folk."

The brunette chuckles. "My mother used to like to tell me that I was descended from French fays. I think she was just having fun with our last name. Du Fae isn't very common, so it was easy to make up something unique about it."

"It's a lovely name," he agrees. "McBoggart sounds like a cheap brand of ale, or a goblin's name. And I hate my first name. My father was James, too."

"Is what why you go by Bog instead? But, wait – if you're named for your father, how come – s-sorry, I creeped on your license when you bought that liquor, and that's how I learned your name – how come you're not, like, James M. McBoggart II, or James M. McBoggart Jr.?"

He blanches. "Disgusting. I was a junior. You can imagine my father, sounding like Sean Connery in Last Crusade, always calling me Junior. I hated it. And I hated him, that shouting alcoholic Scotsman living up to the negative stereotype. I didn't want to be like him, or named for him, either."

"But… You're still a James?" she frowns, mystified. "Why don't you change it?"

"My mother wouldn't let me get rid of it. So I legally changed my middle name instead, and dropped the 'jr'," Bog informs.

"Really?" Marianne grins, interested. "What's your middle name, then?"

"…You'll laugh."

"Well, I saw on your ID that it stars with M! If you don't tell me," she teases, "I'll have to start guessing. Michael? Mitch or Mitchell? Magnus? Matthew?"

"Uhg, stop!" He seethes. "It's Misery! My middle name… is Misery."

Marianne blinks, stunned. "Misery? As in… woe? Sorrow? Desolation and gloom?"

"Yes. That misery."

A laugh bubbles up. "Oh my god, like in the song! 'Cause I'm evil… my middle name is misery,''" she talk-sings. "That's fucking incredible. I love it."

"No, you don't. You're fuckin' laughin' at me. Don't bloody patronize me, woman."

"I'm not!" Marianne says, although she's still giggling. "I really, truly, love it. Seriously. You can go up to people and whisper sinisterly in their ear, 'You think you know misery? My middle name is Misery, bub. Don't fuck with me.' – God, names me want to change my middle name to Danger, so I can actually tell people that 'Danger is my middle name!'"

He shakes his head at her, incredulous expression on his face, and then soon, he's laughing outright. He can't stop. "Still doesn't save me name, though. McBoggart is still the worst of it. I'd change that one if I could."

"Oh, come on! I kinda like it. It sounds like a professor's name to me. 'Dr. J. McBoggart, author of How To Fuck A Guy Up And Save The Girl In A Dirty Bar Fight.'"

He snorts, peering over at her with a smile. "I didn't do much."

"Are you kidding? You saved my ass. I was in deep shit."

He pauses, studying her, then looks away, pretending to adjust the percolator. "Did you... mean all that? The… the things you said about me to that manic blond prick?"

She smiles a bit at the insult at Roland's expense, then her face falls a little as she considers him. "Of course I did. Why would I make that up?"

"I just… don't see myself that way," he replies vaguely.

"Well, I do," Marianne states firmly, getting up off her chair to come stand in front of him. She tilts her head to meet his gaze, and his eyes pan over to her. "Look, I don't know if it was those two girls or some elementary school bullies or any other kind of idiot who made you lose sight of your own self-worth, but Bog, your mother adores you, and I think she and I are proof that you're blind to how you really come off to others."

"Shove off," he mutters, standing up straighter and stepping aside, going to retrieve the creamer and sugar. He isn't sure he can hear this.

"Fuck no!" Marianne tells him, standing her ground in the center of the kitchen. "I won't say this shit again, so you better heed my words, Tough Guy. You're reserved and you have a temper, but you're considerate and shy. You're a bit taller than most and a little awkward socially, but you have clever things to say and great taste in media, if I do say so myself. You play guitar; I saw it in the corner of your bedroom. You draw well, you're creative. You came into a fight against four men, endangering yourself, just to protect me. You're a good fighter and a loyal friend, and if that doesn't make you different and amazing, I don't know what does."

"But people are superficial, Marianne," Bog utters bitterly. "It doesn't matter if I 'have a great personality,'" he mocks, using air quotes with his long fingers, "All people see is my hooked nose and gaunt, scarred face and protruding cheekbones and deep-set eyes and spindly legs and wide shoulders. Most Scotsmen aren't very tall, you know. At least not like me, not built so lean. To most people, I'm a hideous freak of nature."

Marianne's face scrunches up, furious. "If someone told you that load of bullshit, they can go to hell. You are not hideous, and you are not a freak of nature. There are all different standards of beauty in different regions, and America is goddamn picky for some reason. If someone doesn't look like Brad Pitt, they're ugly. Which is fucking untrue."

He's prepared to protest her point before she even gets to it, but she covers his mouth with two fingers. She softens her tone.

"Everyone's tastes in what they find attractive is different, too. One girl might not find you attractive, and, fine. Maybe she likes pro-wrestler, body-builder types. Maybe she likes short guys, or guys with rounded baby-faces.

"But another girl… she might think you're the most handsome guy she's ever seen, and in an unconventional way, because she's an unconventional girl, and to her… that stubble you keep is rugged and gives your face definition, and… that nose is one she could draw and draw just to get it right, a-and… those scars prove that you've overcome things, painful things, that helped shape you to be who you are today. And… maybe… that girl things your eyes are the brightest blue she's ever seen, and thinks they light up your face and speak volumes about what you're really feeling, and maybe she always has this urge to run her thumbs over your cheekbones and down your jaw because of how the angles cross…"

Marianne's eyelids lower to half-mast and she brings her hands up to cup the sides of his face, her thumbs brushing the bottom of his cheekbones, and his heart flares to life like a steam engine, chugging in his chest. His lips part, and before he can stop himself, he leans down the same time she cranes her neck up and their lips meet somewhere in the middle.


	11. Eleven: Tell Him

The press of lips lasts longer than a mere peck. Unsurely, Marianne starts to slide her lips over his, puckering and unpuckering between movements. To her relief, he responds in kind, his hand cupping the back of her head, his fingers threading in her hair. She hum-sighs happily, bother of her hands sliding around to clasp at the nape of his neck, both for leverage on his height and to keep herself from getting so dizzy she tips backward.

There is no tongue, no deeper kiss. After a few movements, Bog ends it with a gentle tug at Marianne's bottom lip with both of his, and they part, though they don't let go. He touches his forehead to hers.

"You've no idea how long Ah've been wantin' to do tha'," he utters in a near whisper, accent thick and husky. It sends a pleasant shiver down Marianne's spine. He lfts his head, looking into her eyes. He brushes a knuckle from her cheek to her ear so lovingly that her heart tightens and tugs, nearly stealing her breath away. "Ah-I just… dinnae know if... if you'd ever let me."

A smile grows warmly on her lips. "That's how I felt, too. See what happens when we both take risks?"

His answering smile is so broad and bright that it clears the slight pain in her chest, and her own smile reopens wider to mirror it.

"Oh, uh – coffee's probably ready," Bog says, clearing his throat and dropping his hands from her. He awkwardly rubs the back of his neck as he turns to take care of it, and she steps back and hugs herself, trying to restore warmth from how cold it feels without his touch. He pours her a cup, steps aside. "You can, uh, add whatever you like."

"Thank you," she murmurs, slightly flushed, and goes about making her cup right alongside him making his. He likes his with no sugar and only creamer to sweeten it. She likes hers embarrassingly sweet, with both sugar and creamer. Her cup turns out decidedly whiter than his.

They find seats in the living room, Bog giving Marianne the couch while he drops into the single chair beside it.

"So, later t'dae –"

"The police?"

"Y-yes."

"Hoo man. I am not looking forward to that."

"Just be honest. You were the target here. They cannae do anything to you when all you did was defend yourself," Bog reminds.

"I know, and I desperately want Roland put away for a while, but it also seems… I don't know. He needs a psychologist and some meds, is what he needs."

"They'll probably supply that. They don't just shut someone away without takin' a look at their mental health first."

"It's just that…" she sips her coffee while she finds the right words, clutching it with both hands like a shield. "As… as much as I hate him now, and as much as I realize how I didn't truly love him then, I just thought I did and went along with it because it's what I thought I had to do, more romanticizing our relationship for being a relationship than, well, feeling it – Some small part of me still cares about him? Is… is worried for him, because what he did – it was so drastic, I worry what sent him over like that? So I don't know… I have… mixed feelings about the police chat."

Bog is quiet for a moment. He leans forward, touches her hand where it has fisted over her knee. "You're a very kind person, Marianne. Not many people are so kind. You have every reason to be cold and unforgiving and spiteful t' him, but instead, ye still are concerned for his wellbeing. That's noble."

She feels a wash of heat and looks away. Her thumb idly rubs the rim of the coffee mug. "It doesn't feel noble. It makes me feel like I have Stockholm Syndrome or something."

He leans back with a short chuckle. "It's nae that. You're just very compassionate 'neath your Tough Girl exterior. And that makes you even stronger. Wish I were more like that, t'be honest."

She beams at him, close-lipped, and then resumes sipping her coffee.

* * *

The police station was a busy place, and once they finally got one of the officers from the bar last night to settle in to question them – separately, to make sure the stories are consistent, and to get the other side – they find the tales coincide with what Bog's mother told them, for as much as she knew, and Marianne was happy to supply the rest of the background that neither member of the McBoggart family is aware of.

The police deem it justified and release them both, and Roland's arrest for battery and the charges for stalking are confirmed, and once Roland hears that Marianne came in for questioning, he cracks and confesses, and takes a bench trial. His sentence hearing will come later, and the police reassure Marianne that little to no effort is needed from her from here on out, thanks to the confession.

Relief floods through Marianne, and suddenly she's just as exhausted as she was the previous night. Rubbing her injured hand idly, Marianne turns to Bog to ask him to drive her home.

Without her even speaking, he nods. "Let's get you home, shall we?"

* * *

Sunny is at work, so it's Dawn who flings open the door. She embraces her big sister the second she walks in the door, and before Bog can turn around and sneak off, Dawn yanks him and pulls him into a hug as well. He doesn't know what to do with his hands, isn't sure how to return the hug as he's being dragged down into it. He sends Marianne a helpless look, and she merely smiles and shrugs.

He opts to pat Dawn's head.

"Oh, Boggy-Woggy, thank you so so sO SOOO much for saving my sister and being there for her at the station and bringing her home safe! I swear to God, you are a keeper in the highest sense of the word. Please stay for a late lunch slash early dinner? I'll make pasta! Something warm and filling after this mess."

She releases him, and he takes a step back, raising his arms in protest. "Um, just Bog, please. And, o-oh, ah, um… I-I'd love to, b-but – I don't want to overstay me welcome, a-and – and Marianne is tired, she should rest, and –"

The blonde waves that aside. "Pfft. So she can take a nap, and meanwhile, I can make some tea and you and I can get to know each other better! Marianne is always talking about you. And every time she stays late at school or is texting someone and I ask what's up, it's always you! So don't be shy, big guy. You're in the friend circle now. There's no escape," and she winks, then giggles. Her pep is infectious, and he feels his shoulders lose their tension.

"Well… ah, alright. I suppose I can stay."

"Eeeee! Yay!" Dawn claps her hands, bouncing up and down a little. "Then come in, come in! And shut the door behind you. What were you, raised in a barn?"

"Actually… yes," he murmurs.

"He was a shepherd boy," Marianne supplies.

Dawn squeals, hands loosely balled up by her jaw. "That's so cute! Man, Boggy, you look scary with all those scars and tattoos – how'd you get those, anyway? More bar fights? – but you're just a big softie. I love it."

"It's… Bog."

"Dawn…" Marianne groans, "You can't just casually ask someone how they got their scars. That's like, super rude. What's gotten into you?"

"Oh, he doesn't mind. Do you, Boggy?"

"Bog."

"Big-Boggy-buddy!"

"…Bog!"

Dawn laughs. She looks over her shoulder at Marianne, who's tiredly dropped onto the sofa. "I like him, Maricat. He's one of those grumps with hearts of gold."

"Uh, Maricat?" he puzzles, looking between the siters.

Marianne groans. "Dawn, please don't –"

"Marianne Catherine De Fae! It's her full name. Sunny says it's a nun's name, which, I guess, makes sense. Our mom was hella Catholic. And she almost got it right on the nose! For a while there, I was worried Maricat would run off and join the covenant because she was so anti-men. That, or a lesbian. But then you came along, and now I'm not worried at all!"

"DAWN!" Marianne blushes a deep pink hue. She gets up and puts her hand over her little sister's mouth. "Bog, I am so, so sorry about this. If you want to go, you're totally welcome to."

He's grinning crookedly, shifting his weight to one foot, one arm lying across his chest tucked into his ribs, the other perched atop it with his cheek in his hand. "Oh, no, at this point, I'm highly entertained. And for being so entertaining, lass, I'll let ye know how I got my scars."

"Awesome!" Dawn bursts, throwing Marianne's hand off. "But hey, you won't make up, like, ten different stories like the Joker, right?"

"No, I'll be truthful."

"Sweet," Dawn beams, and Marianne smacks her own forehead.

"I need a drink," the brunette says tiredly, and heads for the kitchen.

"It's not a very thrilling tale. All but one or two of the scars y'see on me face, neck, arms, hands, and if ye saw my back or legs… They're all from a car accident a few years back."

Marianne stops mid-movement in the kitchen, frozen with a bottle of rum in one hand, half-empty liter of Coke in the other.

"I was driving on the highway, borrowing my mum's car, a wee old Saturn. There was a semi-truck in the lane beside me. It hit something on the road, and two of its tired blew. It swerved and careered sideways, hit me. My car spun, then flipped. It rolled over the road and finally stopped in the ditch to the right. There was broken glass everywhere, and my seatbelt cut into m'neck. They had to use the Jaws of Life to pry open my door and cut me free. I was conscious the entire time, and I could feel every cut. My arm was broken. I fractured my leg. It… took a while to recover."

Marianne finally sets both items down. She's staring at him, and he's actively trying not to look her way, only dares a glance once or twice. She clears her throat. "…Want some of this, Bog?"

He nods. "Double-shot, if you could."

"Aww, poor Boggy," Dawn soothes, patting his arm. She ignores him when he rolls his eyes and corrects her with a curt 'Just Bog,' again. She spins on her heel then, turning to face Marianne. "You! When you're done making drinks, come meet me in my room for a sec, okay? I wanna ask you something."

"Well that sounds promising," Marianne snorts sarcastically. She comes from the kitchen and hands Bog his rum and Coke, then takes hers with her as she follows Dawn to the far side of the three-bedroom apartment.

"Once the door is shut, Dawn launches right into it. "Please tell me you two around going to date. Did you see the way he kept looking at you? And how cool he was about telling his story because you're here? And the fact that he swooped in and fought with you… Marianne, you can't be stupid or stubborn about this. He likes you and he's such a keeper it isn't even funny."

Marianne fidgets. She was afraid of this. "It's… complicated."

"It doesn't have to be!" Dawn urges, making sure to raise her voice in a whisper instead of an octave. "Have you two, all this time, said anything against wanting to date one another? Have either of you made any moves?"

"Well…" Marianne's face twists, and Dawn gets excited.

"You have! Spill it."

"I, uh… kissed him this morning? Or, um – it was pretty mutual, actually."

Dawn conceals her volume with squeaking noises and bouncing. She grabs her sister by the shoulders and shakes her. "Then! Go! Get! Him!"

"I… can't. Not right now. A lot has happened."

Dawn rolls her crystal blue eyes. "Fine, fine. Wait a while for things to simmer down. But then talk to him, ask him out, something! Because you clearly like him too, right?"

"I… I'm not sure," Marianne says softly. "I think it's deeper than that."

"You love him?" Dawn says, and this time, with some level of surprise, her eyes searching Marianne's face.

"I accept him," Marianne says slowly, to clarify. The gears are turning in her head, and the more she speaks, the more she works her thoughts and feelings out. "All his positive attributes and flaws. Everything about him… I never get tired of it. There's never a point where I wish he's stop being a downer, or I want him to shut up. I like to hit him, but I don't want to hit him – like, sparring is really fun but I'd never ever want to hurt him. He's… someone I want to be in my life in some way or another for the rest of my life, because I just have this feeling that he'll always be there for me, and so I want to always be there for him."

"Oh my God," Dawn says softly. "You do love him. And – and I think I feel that way about Sunny…?" The epiphany slaps her in the face. She clamps her hands over her mouth in shock, then stares wide-eyed at Marianne. "Holy shit, I do. That's how I feel about Sunny! Oh my God…"

Marianne can't help but laugh. With relief, with amusement, with joy. "Ohh, man… I was waiting forever for you two to figure that one out."

Dawn moans and covers her face with her hands while she blushes deeply. "I feel like such a clueless moron."

Marianne pats her sister's back sympathetically. "It's okay. You definitely are."

The blonde just groans some more, and together, they return to the living room while Dawn pouts, and Marianne locks eyes with Bog and just smiles.


	12. Twelve: Winding Road Ahead

Marianne comes dragging her feet into the lounge near the cafeteria at the college, finding Bog on one of the couches, textbook in one hand, notebook on his knee, pencil in hand.

She unceremoniously falls down into the sofa and drops her head into his lap, successfully causing his notebook to tumble to the thin carpet below.

"Bad exam?" he remarks with a raised brow. He snaps his textbook shut and tosses it aside. Using the eraser end of his pencil, he taps the tip of Marianne's nose.

She smiles, then feigns melodrama with a limp wrist to her forehead. "It's positively dreadful!" she says with a loose English accent. "I'm afraid I'm much too weary to carry on. Please… tell my professors… I hated them all." And she croaks and goes limp, tongue out, whispering, "I am slain."

Bog can't help himself, he falls into the melodramatic acting with her. "No, dear comrade! You fought nobly. I shan't have you die in vain! I will pass on your message, and take up the pen where you left off." And with a final reach outward and a clench of his hand, he drops his arm and head simultaneously.

Marianne was trying not to crack up, but now she's in a fit of giggles, rolling onto her side toward his stomach. She's warm and smells sweet and spicy, like vanilla cinnamon. He reopens his eyes, peering down at her. Half a beat later, she's turning her head to look at him.

"So," she says, "Have you had any of your finals yet?"

"Not yet," he says. "Most of mine or scheduled between this afternoon and Thursday morning."

"I have all but one of mine today," she sighs heavily. "Ready for the drawing one, though?" She snorts. "It's probably the only one I'm ready for. His study guides are always the exact test."

"I think he does it to ensure our success. He cares more what we create, not what we memorize."

"He's a jerk, but I do appreciate that about him." She hums, yawns. Her eyes stay closed even after the yawn ends. "Okay, so… on a scale from 'go ahead' to 'whatever' to 'get the fuck up, Marianne,' how okay are you with me falling asleep right now?"

"You have an hour and forty…" he checks his phone. "Two minutes. Take a load off."

"You're the best, Big Boggy Buddy."

He deadpans. "Not you, too."

She snorts. "Gotcha." And then her face clears, relaxing of any emotion, and she nestles down for a nap, right there on his left leg. He tries not to blush, and moving as little as possible, he retrieves his textbook and instead of taking notes, he simply reads.

He doesn't retain a single word.

* * *

"Marianne, hey. Marianne," Bog gently touches her shoulder, then grasps it fully for a tiny shake. "Mari, you're drooling."

"I what!" she snorts, sitting up. She touches her jaw, and doesn't feel any moisture. If anything, the corners of her mouth are crusty, and she wipes that. She swallows, looks at Bog. He winks. She scowls. "Bahh, shut up." She rubs at her eyes, then sees her black and blue fingers and groans. "Aww, man… I forgot I was wearing makeup."

"How can you forget you're wearing makeup? Every time I see you, you have smoky eyes."

"I only wear it to school or if I'm going out, like the bar. If you recall, I don't wear it at work, and I don't wear it at home."

"Here," he rolls his eyes, offering the handkerchief from his pocket.

"Thanks," she says. She wipes her hands. "Hey, why do you always have one, anyway? I used your other one for my hand that night, and here's a new one…"

"For under my helmet," he says as if it were obvious. "I don't ride when it gets this cold, but—I carry one out of habit."

"Mm," Marianne stretches, turning to face the right way on the couch. "You know, I've yet to see your bike. What is it?"

"A Harley. Fat Boy," he clarifies. "And, uh… it seats two, if… if you're ever up for a ride, once a nice say in spring rolls around."

"I would love to take a ride on your gallant steed. No cop-outs; the first day that hits fifty degrees, we're going out. – Um, on a ride, I mean. You know…" she quickly adds.

He smiles, amused. "I hope you mean Fahrenheit, because in Celsius, fifty is some deadly weather."

She gives him a shove. "What country are we in right now, Bog?"

"The States."

"And are we in a science class right now?"

"Well, no."

"Then it's Fahrenheit, you doofus," she laughs.

"When you joke in literals in response to my joke in literals, it's really not that funny," he tells her as they gather their things and stand, about to head to their Drawing final. But he's laughing right along with her.

"If it's not funny, then why can't you stop laughing?"

"Because you're absurd! I'm laughing at _you_."

"Just for that insult, Tough Guy, I'm not sitting next to you this period. You can't cheat off me anymore."

"I never cheated off you to begin with, _Tough Girl!_ "

Marianne stops walking. Bog halts, glancing back at her with inquiry written on his face.

"What?"

"…I just had… the best dumb idea."

"Enlighten me," he prods.

"We should get shitty matching tattoos."

"Oh, dear God."

"No, Bog, seriously! Like, the fucking cheesiest. Bad graffiti text or something. And do you know what they'll say?"

He sighs heavily. "I'm sure you're about to tell m-"

"Tough Guy on you, and Tough Girl on me. Boom. Brilliant stupidity. Right?" and she gives a thumbs-up.

"…You're off your rocker," Bog shakes his head at her, but despite his best efforts, he actually considers it. A matching tattoo with new-best-friend-and-not-girlfriend. A permanent mark of their acquaintance. They could stop being friends in a week after getting the tattoos, or worse, date for a couple years and then break it off, and forever have that tattoo that reminds them solely of their connection to the other person.

It's a horrible idea.

"We should absolutely do that."

Marianne fist pumps the air. "Fuck yeah! I knew I could get you on board."

"…Why do I always agree to your terms, again?" Bog wonders as Marianne resumes walking, coming to link their arms together as they march down the hall.

"Because I have one of those faces you can't say 'no' to," she affirms.

"Seems so."

"…Do you think we should get the tattoos in Comic Sans?"

He unlinks arms immediately. "That's it, friendship over, tattoos cancelled."

"Awwww…" Marianne pouts. "Papyrus, then?"

"No."

"Cooper Black."

"Nope."

"Broadway?"

"God, no."

"Arial?"

"No. Try again."

"Baskerville! You gotta like Baskerville. Or maybe Sylfaen?"

"You pronounced that wrong."

"I didn't hear a no~!"

"…Then, no."

"Hmm…" Marianne frowns, thinking, as she paces behind him. "Lucida? Courier? Veranda? Times New Roman? Rockwell, Showcard Gothic… Shit, I'm running out of fonts that I know."

He starts to name a few, listing them off on his fingers. "Playbill. Tahoma, Stencil, Algerian, Webdings –"

"WEBDINGS!" Marianne exclaims, clicking her tongue while snapping her fingers. "Dammit, I knew I was forgetting the most important font of all. Fucking Webdings."

"No one can even _read_ Webdings."

"All the better to get our tattoos in! It'll be our secret what it says. Like a code. And over time, we'll forget altogether. Isn't that perfect?"

"I am not getting a bunch of random symbols as a tattoo."

"Chicken," Marianne teases, right as they reach the class. "I'll convince you yet."

Bog drops his bag down at his seat. "Why don't you draw your own font? Maybe a logo of it? Tough Girl, trademark."

"Hey…" she says as if this never occurred to her, "Not a bad idea…"

"You're hopeless."

"And _you're_ hopeful. I can tell you secretly want to do it and can't wait to see my designs."

"I mean, _yes,_ but tha' donnae mean I'd ever tell you so."

* * *

Following finals, Bog fights with himself for hours, a text in his drafts. All he has to do is hit 'send'. It's for Marianne. It's a request, just a one-sentence question only she can answer.

 _Want to get a drink to celebrate?_

They both passed all their classes, got the credits, did decently on their final exams. It's worth celebrating. And before that kiss – that one, fateful kiss – he would have sent the text in a heartbeat, as soon as he thought of it, as soon as he got his grades back online, and wouldn't have given it a second nor passing thought.

But does it mean more now? Is there connotations here that there weren't before?

He paces back and forth. He sits down in his recliner. He gets up. He leans against the breakfast bar, he pushes himself away. He picks up Bones and worries with idly fingers through his fur. He lets the cat leap out of his arms, continues pacing.

The anxiety he has over this is irrational, he knows. He also knows that Marianne will say yes. He _knows_ this, and that's part of the reason why he's so hesitant to send it.

Will she say yes to it as a friend, or will she say yes to it as a _date_?

Bog runs his hand through his hair, looks at his phone. He opens Instagram. Dawn made him get it, said that if he has a smartphone, he should treat it like one. She got him a twitter, too, without his noticing. He doesn't use that, though. But Instagram he's gotten a bit fond of; he realizes he likes to take artsy pictures, use the filters to their utmost potential, as well as give gratuitous shots of his cat because who doesn't love cute cats?

But there are a couple photos without filters, that aren't artsy or of his cat.

Selfies with Marianne.

A couple she even took herself, uploading with the tags, #lolstolemybffsphone and #dontdeletethisbogorillkillyou.

He scrolls through these, sighing through his nose. Gathering courage.

Dating connotations or not, he has a night off and it's one he wants to spend celebrating and drinking with Marianne at a bar that isn't his own.

He hits 'send.'

* * *

"Marianne, you got a text," Dawn calls out from the table, painting her nails. "Mari Kitty Catty Anne!" she hollers. "It could be Boggy!"

"I'm coming, I'm coming…" Marianne sighs, finishing dumping her laundry of the week into the washer, shutting the lid. She shuffles into the kitchen in her zombie head slippers, a gag gift from Sunny one Christmas.

"Who am I kidding, I _know_ it's Bog. Who else even texts you besides me and him?"

"Dad, sometimes."

Dawn scoffs. "Like, for your birthday."

"Sunny, too!"

"Only if he needs a ride."

"…Oh, can it, Dawn. Have you told our dear friend how you feel yet?"

Dawn flushes crimson, but responds, "Duhh, of course! He's my boyfriend now. Unlike _some people_ ," she punctuates with a flick of the brush on her nail, "I don't dance around the subject."

"Whatever," Marianne dismisses it as she walks away with her phone. She unlocks her screen and pulls up the message.

A drink? Yeah, of course. She was thinking of asking him that, actually. She asks when and where, hits send.

 _Tonight. Not the Castle. Want to try somewhere new?_

She shrugs. Type s-u-r-e, send.

 _Pick up, or meet there? I can give directions._

She frowns. 'Why does it matter?' She's about to type, then erases it. 'I don't care which,' she almost sends, then erases it.

It does matter. She does care.

Picking her up means it's a date. Meeting there means they're going as friends.

Unless –

Oh, duh! He's asking because he wants to know if she has her car. As it happens, she doesn't. Sunny took it to work. She and Dawn are off tonight, so he was fully allowed to.

'Sunny has my car,' she says, 'So pick me up? I don't wanna pay cab fare.' Sends it.

It takes him a couple minutes to respond, as opposed to his instant answers before. She notices this, but doesn't think on it whatsoever.

 _See you soon, then._ Is all she gets.

* * *

Bog frowns at his closet. He's picking her up, but out of necessity. So it's not a date. But it could be a date? He wants it to be a date. How does one dress for a hopeful-not-official date? Is his wardrobe even broad enough to encompass anything close to that range of variation?

No, he realizes. No, it really isn't nearly large enough. His options are much too limited, and suddenly, he wishes he were more fashionable, or at least spent more money on new clothes more often.

He decides on his favorite leather jacket over a hand-me-down Johnny Cash shirt peeking out from beneath a dark wash denim jacket. Are two jackets one too many? Doesn't seem so for the Winchesters, but then again, they film that shit in Canada.

Bog tosses off his layers in frustration. He layers a button-up over the tee, then his leather jacket. It looks wrong, too. He removes all his layers and sits down on his bed, shirtless.

Well, how forward would it be if he showed up like this?

…Cold. It would be really, very cold. It's December, for crying out loud.

In the end, he picks Johnny back up, wears it and the leather, and it'll have to do.

Stepping outside, he thinks he perhaps should invest in something warmer, like a pea coat. Would he look good in a pea coat? Is that too hipster for him? He isn't sure. Wool would be warmer, that's all.

* * *

"It's a date."

"It's not a date."

"It so totally _is_! Dress nice. Be _sexy_! What about that wine red dress you have? Or that open-backed black dress, you know, the one with the skeleton ribs and spine? The holes in it will make your tattoo peek through!"

"I'm not wearing a dress. It's not a cocktail party, it's a bar."

"So! Who cares? Don't you want to look alluring for your man?'

"H-he's… not my man…"

"He could be! And damn well _should_ be. Just trust me, Marianne! Wear something nice. So that way, it could maybe possibly turn INto a date."

She shakes her head at the blonde and finally manages to kick her out of her room. Locking the bedroom door, Marianne sits in her bra and clean jeans on her bed and stares at her closet.

She gets up, shifts through her shirts, finds a silky purple one, holds it up to herself in the mirror.

Nope.

She holds up a dark leafy green one with a lacy bottom.

Nuh-uh.

She holds up a black tank with skulls and inverted crosses and cracked hearts on it.

Ew, no. She should really toss that one, which was more for her high school 'I'm so misunderstood and listen exclusively to Evanescence' vibe. Which, she still listens to the heavenly sounds of Amy Lee's vocals, but less to be edgy and cool and certainly not exclusively, and more because there's no denying the talent there.

Sighing, Marianne settles for a casual approach. Her jeans, plus a Shinedown concert tee with a denim jacket over it. There, whatever. She's herself, not some beautified version.

Good enough.

She combs her hair, reapplies one eyelid that she accidentally touched while getting frustrated over clothing, and by the time her knee-high black boots are zipped up, her phone is vibrating.

 _I'm here._

She snatches it off its charger with a smile, grabs her wallet, and with a shove of it into her back pocket, heads out the door.

"See ya, Dawn! Don't wait up!"

"Oh, I won't," Dawn chirps in response. She texts Sunny, taking bets on if there will be another sleepover. Then they cancel the bet, because they both can't choose yes.


	13. Thirteen: Collateral

In Bog's jeep, the radio is on low, playing a station with a mix of rock subgenres. It'll play anything from Metallica to Green Day to Elvis to Mumford and Sons. It's like putting Marianne's entire iPod library on shuffle, apart from her embarrassingly broad collection of film and Broadway soundtracks she pretends she doesn't have. Still, the station makes for the perfect background noise.

"So, how drunk are we getting tonight?" Marianne inquires with a smile. "On a scale from 'mild housewife wine buzz while she cooks dinner for her five children' to 'completely white-girl wasted.'"

"Hmm, by that unit of measurement," Bog considers, "I'd say… roughly around 'sailor and crewmates freshly returning home from a long voyage at sea.'"

"So, basically… hardly a step up from 'white-girl wasted,'" she cackles. "I can dig it." She frowns, looking at him. "Hey, wait! If I'll be drunk, and you'll be drunk… who's going to drive us home?"

"Oh, I've got that taken care of. I told my pal Brutus to walk over after his shift at King's to chauffeur us back to my flat in my car. He lives in a shack on the street behind my building, so he can walk home."

"Well, it's that convenient."

"Oh, we've done it loads of times. It got easier once I moved. His walk used to be, uh… decidedly much further."

She laughs, shaking her head. "You're a terrible friend. Remind me not to befriend you."

"Too late for tha', I'm afraid."

They both laugh.

The radio returns from commercial break, and Marianne perks up when she recognizes the opening chords. "Oh, oh! Turn it up, I love this song!"

The lyrics start to roll in, and she looks at him and starts to sing along, loud even after he makes the radio louder.

 _"I could stand behind my barricade, do what I'm told and be afraid to change; while isolated by the mainstream, with the current up against me…"_

"What is this," Bog frowns. "I feel like I know the artist?"

Marianne keeps grinning, still singing, starting to make some animated gestures along with the words. _"Well maybe if my arms were ten feet tall, I could finally reach that crystal ball… 'Cause I… still find, inside… There's something braver…! And I, I won't be, I won't be…"_ She closes her eyes and starts doing rapid air drums, " _The silent damnation!"_

She starts to get really pumped for the chorus, and between watching the road and watching Marianne, Bog is torn between concern and amusement.

 _"I… will never be voiceless! My weapon of choice is: I'd rather be dangerous! I won't be left defenseless, as God as my witness, I'd rather be dangerous! Daaaangerous!"_

Bog can't stop laughing now with her passion, fists flying and determined expression on her face. Stopping at a light and haring her reduce the rest to giggles, he can't help but add, "And you thought _my_ voice was good enough to go professional. Have you heard yourself lately? Your vocals, my dear, are _incomparable._ "

"Oh, pfft," Marianne waves it away. "Are not. Plenty of people can sing better than me."

"Really? Are you quite certain of that?" he challenges with a raise of his brow, "Because I beg to differ. You have the most incredible singing voice I have ever heard. All the right tones of 'soft prettiness' and 'gritty rock' combined."

Marianne is sincerely flattered, because Bog sounds sincerely convinced. "In that case… thank you," and she means it. She smiles, reached over, touches his arm. He smiles back.

"Seriously, though," he remarks, "Who was that?"

"Shinedown." She gestures to her shirt. "Their new CD. I saw them in concert for it, hence the tee."

"How miraculous that they came on my radio the night you wear that."

"It's probability, man," she reminds. "Was bound to happen eventually. Thems the odds."

"Indeed," he agrees, amused.

They pull into a parking lot after another fifteen minutes of singing loudly and poorly along with the radio and chatting idly in between. The bar itself is more modern than Marianne would have thought Bog to choose; entering from the front, it works like a speakeasy, having a side staircase from the main building above that leads one to the basement where the bar resides. There are abstract shapes that function both as wall art and some as lamps, and the lighting is brighter than the dying dim of King's Castle, and more colorful. Around the bar is a blue LED sort of hue, and through an archway, there is a dancefloor with bodies grooving beneath colored orbs and dancing laser patterns. The jukebox is a touchscreen mounted on a brick pillar, stocked full of billions of songs.

There is also a wall painted from end to end, top to bottom in a long mural of warped creatures in bright colors, overlapping and flowing into one another across some vague… sky? space? sort of scene.

This place is incredible.

It might also be in neither of their tastes.

"What made you want to check this place out?" she raises both brows in curiosity as they find a red-leather booth in the corner and sit down. They can see the dancefloor from here. Nearly everyone is in a circle, watching one or two people show off their breakdancing skills.

"I don't know… Think of it as an adventure," he encourages. "It's kind of… funky-modern-vaguely-hipster because it's filled with artistic aesthetics and high tech, but that's what makes it fun. We can sit here and joke about what bars have turned in to nowadays. This could easily be some sort of new-agey coffee shop if they turned the lights up."

Marianne stifles a laugh, then nods enthusiastically. "Oooh-kay, you've sold me. So, what drink should I try to match a place like this?"

"There's always Toxic Waste. Or Bloody Smurf Jizz, if you prefer."

Marianne's jaw hangs. "Are those… _real_ drinks?"

He nods. "Toxic Waste is one part Blue Curacao liqueur, six parts OJ, and one part triple sec. Although I like to trade the orange juice for Mountain Dew for a truly radioactive glow, and vary the flavor of triple sec when I do, because orange and Dew don't always mix. Liberties are allowed by bartender, I firmly believe. If only for what's in stock if nothing else."

"Okay, okay. That drink I get, then. But what in the hell is _Bloody Smurf Jizz?_ That just _sounds_ disgusting."

Bog grins. "And you're correct. It's Blue Curacao again, but this time, with grenadine syrup, a splash of Bailey's Irish cream, and Sprite to taste."

She shudders. "That's sugar on acid, is what that is."

"And you should see the color it makes," he laughs. "It's nauseating. If you get it just right, before it mixes, it makes this sort of drippy –"

"Please stop," Marianne pretends to gag, covering her mouth. "I'll lose my lunch."

"Good," he remarks, "We can't have any food slowing your decent into inebriation, can we?"

She snorts and reaches over to elbow him. He catches her elbow, then pulls her closer. Her eyes change from humor to something softer, and it's no secret when they begin to dart between his eyes and his lips.

His smile fades, and he starts to lean in, but his public embarrassment wins out over following through on the moment. He releases Marianne, and slides out of the booth. "I'm, um, going to go get drinks. What do you want?"

"Surprise me," she says. "Except no Smurfs!"

"Wouldn't dream of it!" he calls back, already walking up to the bar. Unlike the long strip at King's Castle, this place has a square missing its back side, with all the liquor in an island in the middle, and the tap in the center across from the island. There are two 'tenders; one female, dressed to the nines in true grunge fashion, the other a flamboyantly gay male with hot pink hair. The man is the one who comes to Bog, flashing a polite smile as he leans in to hear Bog's orders.

"Ooh, haven't made one of those in a while!" he chuckles, and his nametag spells out that he's the owner of the bar. Bog recognizes the name; the same guy also owns another bar down the street. He's see him bar hop between the two, come to think of it.

After a spell, the owner returns, both drinks in hand.

"Here you go. Want to open a tab?"

Bog nods, handing over his card. He takes the drinks, returns to Marianne.

"Whoa. Isn't that very… Purple?" she says after a moment searching for an acceptable adjective. She makes a sort of bewildered frown and toss of her head, cracking a smile. "My favorite color, come to life for consumption. I should have figured you'd go that route. But... what is it? And _what's_ in it?"

"It's an Alluring Lullaby," Bog informs her as he sets it down before her. He scoots back into his own place beside her in the booth. "It's Viniq, Hpnotiq, grape vodka, and a lemon-lime soda. In this case, 7Up."

"It's certainly nice to look at, but how does it taste?" she lifts a brow, then brings the cocktail to her lips for a sip. She lifts her brows as she swallows. Setting it down, she nods. "Not bad. Really not bad at all. I don't know if it's a new favorite, but I like it. Nice choice." She looks over at his monstrosity and laughs. "Okay, what is _yours,_ though. I thought for sure you'd just get a beer or something on the rocks."

"I can have those any time," he says, lifting his vibrant drink to his lips. "It's much too much money and effort to buy all the ingredients for a mixed drink to make at home, and I don't drink while on the job. So the chance I get to have somebody else do it for me," he says as he takes a swig, "I seize it. And in this case, I decided to order myself."

Marianne laughs, a full surprise snort followed by her head tossing back. She sips at her own drink again. "Incredible." She shakes her head. "You never said its name, though! Maybe I want to order one for myself?"

He grins. "Swamp Water."

Marianne can't believe it. "You didn't."

"I did."

"Bog… ordered himself… because it's Swamp Water…" She shakes her head with the stupidest grin on her mouth that is so large it's painful. The brunette starts to get up, hands poised in surrender. "That's it, I'm leaving. You've made a horrible pun and I will never forgive you."

"It's disgustingly delicious," he says, not fazed by her threat. "Wild Shot Silver, Apple Pucker, Simple Syrup, Midori, sweet and sour mix, lime juice, and look! They even gave me a chipper cherry," he says, fishing it out with his fingers to pop into his mouth.

"It sounds as sour as your personality."

"Hence why it's perfect." He takes another long sip, licks his lips. Bog lifts his mason jar in her direction. "Cheers."

Marianne has her hands on her hips and she is torn between hitting him and kissing the smug look off his face.

She decides against doing either, but oh, she came so close.

Resuming her seat with a satisfied sigh as she plops down, Marianne takes her drink back up and slams some of it back.

"Cheers," she gives in, clinking glasses with him, then downing the rest. "I'm going to get four shots with the most ridiculous names in the bartender's repertoire, and when I get back, we're each taking two the other picks out for us. To toast getting through a semester and passing finals and meeting one another. Deal?"

"I like the way you think. And God knows I love a challenge. But aren't I at a bit of a disadvantage? You're going to probably plan the two for me before you even sit back down."

"I'll let you choose first, then," Marianne says, scooting out of the booth. "Oh, and – did you open a tab?"

"Aye."

"…Well, fuck your tab, these shots are on me. I'll open my own tab."

He chuckles. "Suit yourself. See you soon."

She salutes him with her middle finger as the only finger up to touch her forehead and out, and then she heads for the bar.

"'Tender," she says, and the grungy woman slides over to her, pleasant smile in greeting.

"What would you like, sweetheart?" she asks. She can't be more than ten years older than Marianne herself.

"I want four shots with the most ridiculous and-or sexual names you can think of."

"Oh! Fun," she laughs, and thinks for a moment, scanning down a list. "Well, off the top of my head, there's… a Quick Fuck, Shit on the Grass, Duck Fart, Cock Sucking Cowboy, Monkey Brain – which looks exactly how it sounds – Fallen Froggie, an Alien or normal Brain Hemorrhage, a Screaming Orgasm, a Squashed Frog, a Wet Pussy, or my favorite, a Brain Damage shot. So take your pick, those are all the ridiculous and sexual ones I know, personally."

Marianne can't stop laughing. "Oh my God… they all sound incredibly amazing," she says softly. "Hm. Well, I don't want either of us to suffer from brain damage with whatever is in _that_ –"

"Oh, a _fuck_ load, trust me."

" – So give me a Monkey Brain, an Alien Brain Hemorrhage, a Duck Fart, and… a Fallen Froggie. Oh! And can you put, like, sticky notes on them so I know which is which?"

"Absolutely," she chuckles. She takes Marianne's card, Marianne opens a tab, and after a little while, Marianne is carrying back four shots on a small circular tray.

"Here you go, asshole. Ridiculous shots. Which ones are you going to pick out for me?"

"Well, let's see here… Oh, dear _Lord_. Y'dinnae have to get the stupidest ones, did you?"

"I also could have gotten the most sexual. In fact, I think I will; next time, I'm getting a Wet Pussy and a Cock Sucking Cowboy having a Quick Fuck until Screaming Orgasm."

"…How long did it take you to think of that sentence."

"The whole time she was making these, plus the entire walk over here," Marianne admits, falling into her seat beside him. "Now choose!"

" _I'll_ buy those next shots, thanks. And for you, my dear, you can have the two most disgusting in appearance." He slides over the Hemorrhage and Monkey with a disgusted curl of his lip. "That Alien bit most resembles a Bloody Smurf Jizz before it settles, by the way. In case you wanted that visual after all."

"Ohh, nasty…" she cringes, then laughs. She slides him the Froggie and Fart. "To the education we're earning and then immediately disposing of by killing our brain cells!" she says cheerfully.

"To our fallen brain cell comrades! They served us well," Bog agrees, lifting his first shot in salute to hers, and then they both slam them back. Marianne has to do hers in two parts, because they are a bit larger of shots than she's used to. This bar uses bigger shot glasses, to give you the most of what you pay for. Which is great, but now she has to taste this bizarre concoction of sweetness and fire twice.

They move on to their second round of shots, making faces and commentary – "I've made these godawful things before but I've never tasted them." "I didn't even know they existed! All this time I've been ordering from bars and being really boring about it. Next time, I'm bringing a list with me of a bunch of stupid drinks, and I'm going to see how many a bartender knows." – and beginning to feel the buzz crawl over their brains.

Bog shimmies out of the booth. He takes up the tray, empty glasses on it, and gets the four previously mentioned sexual shots.

When he returns, the colors alone make Marianne raise a brow. He doesn't have sticky notes on them; he knows them all from experience.

"How long did you bartend before you retired to the kitchen? You make it sound like it wasn't for very long, but… you sure know a lot," Marianne says.

He sets the drinks down, sits beside her, lines them up between them. "I was a bartender for three years, when I first started at the bar. And after one too many incidents – including breaking up fights that I wound up finishing – I decided my temper wasn't suited for it. And then you have my mother, who has been around a long time as a 'tender and taught me all I know, who learns and creates new drinks all the time and shares them with me."

"That's so cool."

"Anyway, here is your Pussy, Cowboy, Fuck, and Orgasm." He points to each one respectively, and she snorts. "Your turn to choose first."

"You can have the Wet Pussy and Screaming Orgasm. I really want that Quick Fuck, it looks awesome."

"I feel like there is a euphemism in there somewhere. A barely disguised one."

"Please!" Marianne scoffs. "I'm not about dirty talk and one night stands. If I wanted to bone you, I'd let you know, sure, but I'd be discreet and sincere about it."

"Oh?" he prods, pretending he isn't nearly as curious as he is. He's also learning that, given her petite form and lack of food in recent hours, Marianne cannot hold her liquor well. She's definitely getting loose-lipped the more she drinks. They tap shots, take the first round.

Marianne wiped her lips with her thumb, then licks off the foam. Bog's inhale is slow and stiff through his nose as he catches her doing this. She seems to shrug, though he's too distracted now to notice. "I mean…" she gets a little embarrassed, shaking her head. "I'm a little old-fashioned, okay? Not that I want my first time to be special, but – I want it to be with someone I love, who I know for sure loves me, whom I can share that… that closeness and bond with without the fear that – that they might…"

"Leave. Or… cheat."

"…Yeah," she agrees, a bit too quietly compared to the music, so Bog merely reads her lips. She sighs, fingering the edge of empty shot in her hand. "I don't want to feel used again, especially not post-coital, you know? That would be…"

"The worst."

"Absolutely the worst," she grumbles, a little bitter. She reaches for her Cowboy. "But, somehow, I know you wouldn't do that to me."

"Of course not. I would never do that to anyone, least of all my dearest friend."

That makes her laugh, the alcohol tickling her brain. "'Dearest friend'? What era are we in?" and she snorts while laughing, then snorts again because she snorted, and she covers her mouth and nose, but she's still giggling.

Bog starts to laugh, in increments, until he snorts, too, and she uncovers her mouth and doubles over in laughter. Some of it is the alcohol, but some of it is the embarrassment of the topic, and some of it is just from enjoying Bog's company so much. His presence and vibe, his face in the soft and colorful lighting, his shoulders shaking with delight, his voice and his smile.

Marianne's laughter dies off, and she's left with a tender smile that covers her teeth. She nods her head to their remaining shots, and then down them.

"Oh, boy. I better stop wand wait while all that shit kicks in," she sways a little in her seat, and Bog instinctively places his hand on her back for support. She stills, turns to look at him. He starts to remove his hand, but she catches his shoulder, lowering it to keep his hand there. She scoots closer. "You know, Bog, I…"

"You… what?" he slurs a little, the alcohol showing affect before he really starts to feel it.

"'M not sayin' this 'cause of the alcohol, 'm really sayin' this 'cause somewhere down the line it hap'n'd and I've just been scared it was all in m'head, but now…"

"Marianne," he starts to warn her, his eyes full of pleading as they search her face. But his eyes get distracted between looking into hers, darting to her lips, scanning over her cheeks and nose and earrings and hair. "It is the alcohol, don't –"

"It's _not_ ," she clarifies in the most sober tone, so crystal clear that Bog has to do a double-take at her eyes to be sure. "I was… I's goin' to say _something_ tonight anyway, if… if thin's went right."

"Are they? Are they, um… going right?" he murmurs, only audible because a song is ending, and there is a space between while someone browses the jukebox, looking for another.

"Extremely right," she smiles at him, leaning in.

He isn't sure what to do, his hand hovers scant centimeters from her back, and her warm hand is landing on his chest, and his heart is beating faster and his breath is starting to get deeper, and what are the morals, again, when someone is drunk and coming onto you? They're bad, right? Like, the person technically doesn't know what they're doing and –

"I always remember everything from when I'm drunk," she says firmly, as if reading his mind. "I know what I'm doing. 'M jus'… finally doing it, after… a while of _not_ doing it."

Bog is torn between panic and desire. That stay-or-flee dichotomy waging within him, one part desperately wanting to wrap his arms around her and kiss here like there's no tomorrow, only tonight and this bar and this booth and her warmth; but the other part, the more rational, less emotional part, is reminded that this blow off outing is both turning out as he expected and better than he expected, and he's a little worried it won't mean the same tomorrow, or that he isn't ready to deal with accepting that the girl he's fallen in love with – and oh, boy, there it is, the facts laid out before him, and that's scary, too – might actually love him equally as much – which is a new concept to grasp, too; usually it's very one-sided on his part – and maybe now isn't the best time because, shit, he can feel the drunkenness sinking in, and it's starting to get a hold of her, too, and –

"Bog…" she whispers, her face up to his, and whoa, when did that happen? He can smell her sweet breath, a mingling of flavors from the shots, but it's a pleasant mix, and God, please end his suffering, he doesn't know if he can take this much longer.

"How 'bout we – dance?" he says suddenly. He caved in and kissed her once before, but the meaning was different then. It felt more like a comfort than a confirmation. This would feel too much like a confirmation.

She retracts her face, but her hand on his chest and proximity to his body remains. "What?"

Bog looks sheepish. "I just… mean… the dancefloor looks mostly clear?" he glances over her shoulder to be sure. His bluff is true, thankfully. "And… none of those people really know how to dance. We should show them."

She expression is muddled and disenchanted for a moment, then she warms to the idea. "What did you have in mind?"

"'50s prom in full swing."

Marianne leans off of him. She seems to be either considering it or picturing it. Then she nods, stumbles out of the booth, and tugs at his arm while he follows suit.

Out on the dancefloor, there are one or two guys around girls about two seconds from grinding or making out, and then the two friends make it to the center, Bog takes Marianne's hand, and with more internalized grace than outward grace, he spins her into his arms and back out again, and their dance begins.

They Swing together and Bop apart, mixing partial Hand Jives in between, whatever they know, whatever feels right, whatever eventually brings them back into each other's arms. It's a variation of a Waltz, it's an attempt at a two-person Madison, it's some Twist and Mashed Potato and Tango moves all rolled into one sequence of dancing to some upbeat and club remixed Ellie Goulding song.

Marianne is tripping and making mistakes, and so is Bog, and they're laughing and bumping into each other and getting dizzy, so dizzy, but the elation is winning out over all else.

A crowd starts to form, people cheering, and when the song ends and changes, Bog spins Marianne back to him and clasps her hand in his, his other hand coming around to the small of her back. She rests her free hand on his ribs, since it's awkward to stretch all the way up to his shoulder.

He touches his forehead to her head, and their energetic dance calms to a slow dance all their own, despite the music, and their Waltz becomes more traditional. Someone from the crowd – a girl – actually goes and changes the music on the jukebox to something Adele to suit their sway while Bog and Marianne catch their breath.

After pressing her cheek to Bog's chest, his chin on her head, Marianne utters, "Ev'rything… feels _right_ with you. I – I'm _safe_ and I'm having _fun_ I'm not scared or lonely or behind my def'nses 'nymore, and you _get_ me 'cause we're alike and we contrast jus' th'right way."

"I feel th'same," Bog whispers. The statement resonates so deeply within him, he's wondered why he's never told her the exact thing before. All these months, and even casually, he never told her how much she means to him for precisely those reasons.

Marianne holds her breath for a moment. Then she buries her face in his clothes, arms wrapping around his torso, her hot breath and his body heat and thumping heart enveloping her.

"Bog… I love you."


	14. Fourteen: Togetherness

He can feel himself go rigid, the muscles in his shoulders and down his spine tensing defensively.

No one has ever said that to him before.

Oh, his mother has said she loves him many a time, but that isn't what he means. He means _romantically_ no one has expressed their love for him. He always figured it was because he was unlovable. Too hideous, too grouchy, too quick-tempered, too awkward, too sensitive, too much of a stereotype on the outside, and too much of a hopeless dork in the inside to be loved by anyone but his mother.

And yet, startlingly, here is proof that negates what he always felt was fact.

Bog forces himself to relax. He brings Marianne out to arm's length, no longer dancing. Oh, he still sways, but that's because every combination of alcohol is beginning to set in and make itself at home in his brain juices. Marianne wobbles even more, only able to stand upright with Bog's assistance.

"If you wake up t'm'rra, and afta yer hangover pass's and your head is clear, if… 'f you still 'member this, assumin' what you said holds true – then… th-then you c'n'say that again, and I'll belieef you. Bu' right now, I think –"

"It _iiis_ true!" Marianne slurs, ineffectively trying to shove him. She looks upset, on the brink of either crying or shouting. "I lofe –"

"Yer jus'… dancin' wif me and 'r' happy, so it's easy t'say –"

"Fuck you!" Marianne decides to be angry about this, but not without tears forming in her eyes. She breaks apart from him, stumble-running to go to the bathroom.

"Marianne!" he calls after her, trying to stop her. But with a bathroom door in his face, he can't barge in. He slumps.

People are staring, wondering what happened to the couple that was being so cute a moment ago. One person mutters (loud, drunkly) to another something along the lines of what did that gargoyle guy say to make that cute girl run off like that, and Bog stops and throws a punch at whoever spoke, gripping the man by the collar and asking him to dare say it again.

A fight doesn't break out, and he wishes one were to. Instead, he gets politely asked to pay his tab and leave.

He steals one longing glance at the ladies' restroom before begrudgingly nodding. He pays, exits the building. He sits down on the cold cement just outside, so Marianne won't think he abandoned her. He puts his face in his hands.

"Well, now ya'gone 'n' done it, ye piece of horse shite," he mumbles. He bites his bottom lip to keep from shedding a tear, because high emotions from alcohol or not, it's no excuse.

* * *

Marianne sniffs and dabs at her makeup on her face. She can't believe she actually said it, and worse, that he must not feel the same, or else he would have returned it, instead of…

She bangs the side of her fist against the sink. She hears the resounding quake, brief as it is, make a loose washer around a screw jingle.

Then she hears some ruckus outside, and looks toward the door. Sounds like a fight. Sounds like Bog.

She realizes quickly just how badly of damaged goods they both are. Emotionally, they have a lot they can't face or don't feel worthy of.

The sluggish epiphany makes her stumble back, wide-eyed at her own reflection. She closes her eyes, rests her back against one of the dividers between stall doors, and sinks to sit on the shockingly clean floor.

(Jeez, this bar's bathrooms even have high-end-coffee-shop-like standards.)

Fine. So he won't accept it right now, and that she can blame on how drunk they both are. It begs repeating, anyway! It's too strong to go ignored. She'll say it again in the morning, like he asked. She _will_ remember and if she starts having some water and food now, her hangover should be considerably less painful, too.

Good. A plan. Good.

Marianne gets up and leaves the safe haven of the empty bathroom just as another woman goes staggering in her heels to go piss.

* * *

"Um… H-hey."

"…Hey…"

Her hands are shoved deep into her coat pockets, and she more crashes to the cement step beside him than sits down. Her nose is already cold, the rest of her a mix between warm with alcohol, numb with inebriation, and shivering with cold.

"Brute's on 'is way. He's gettin' me car."

"Bog –"

"Mari –"

They look at each other, huff a laugh, their breaths coming out in misty clouds.

"You first."

"Nae, y'can go first."

"I-it's nothing, I was just… going to say –"

"I'm sorry."

She sighs. "Yeah… exactly."

"No, Ah'm r'lly sorry. I reacted –"

"No, n-no… 'M surry, I jus' sorta… It spilled out."

"An… accident?"

"Kinda."

He looks away. "I shouldda known."

"No!" Marianne says, frustrated. She goes to stand, but soon regrets it. She's back down beside him, bumping into him. "I mean… I's g'nna say it, I jus'… bad timing."

"Mhm."

"Really!" She reaffirms, giving him a hard nudge.

"Like I said… tell me 'gain t'marra."

"…Okay," she says. She takes his jaw in her hand and turns his face toward hers. She tries her best to make eye contact and keep it. "I will. Jus' you wait."

A sad smile lifts the corner of his mouth. Playful, albeit with a shred of that same sadness, he adds, "Not if Ah beat ye to it."

Impulsively, she darts a peck to his lips, quick and firm, before releasing his jaw. He blinks at her, and she smiles lazily. "You're on."

They're quiet for a long moment, both of them looking out at the buildings around them. Marianne blinks when something cold touches her lashes. She looks around, and within minutes, there are more and more.

"It's… snowing," she breathes, and each snowflake seems to steal the noise from the air.

Bog holds out a hand, trying to catch one of the flurry's flakes. It bobs and skitters, and a different one lands on his rough palm. "So it is."

Brutus pulls up in Bog's car, and he stands to help her in before getting in himself. They're quiet the entire way back to Bog's apartment, Marianne sleepily looking out at the snowfall. Bog can't take his eyes off her.

The couch is already made up for Marianne.

* * *

At some point during the night, Marianne is too cold on the couch. Her bladder is also full. So, still drunk and without thinking, she gets up, uses the restroom, and instead of exiting Bog's room to return to the cold couch, she crawls into Bog's bed.

He stirs, and once she's settled down, nestled cozy beside his sleep-warm skin – the alcohol made him too hot for a shirt, so all he has on are his long lounge pants, decked out in an Incredible Hulk comic pattern – he, still drunk as well, casually wraps am arm around her torso, all without opening an eye or fully waking.

Marianne sighs happily, laying her forearm over his. She can feel his slow and steady breaths at the back of her neck, his other arm tucked under his pillow, her other arm stretched out before her. She closes her eyes.

She doesn't wake again until morning.

* * *

When Bog comes to, the pain in his lower stomach urging him to rise for a potty break, the first thing he notices is how warm he is. Warmer than usual, like… like borderline on fire. Second, as he starts to wake, he realizes that he smells Marianne's shampoo, her perfume, albeit muffled with the skin-scent of early mornings. He shifts, finds his leg caught between two other legs, his hand is lying on something solid, and his arm is asleep where its pinned beneath something.

His eyes snap open, and he finds Marianne in front of him, his hand on her hip-slash-upper-thigh atop the duvet cover, and it's her head that made his fingers numb, and her legs trapping his own.

He violently jerks back, yanking himself free, and she hums and yawns and mumbles, "Bog… don't." Before settling to lie on her stomach, arms under his spare pillow, her face smudging makeup onto the case.

His heart is beating rapidly, and wow, okay, while he is certainly used to waking half-hard, this is a legitimate reason for morning wood that he's never had the pleasure to experience before. He shakily heads for the bathroom, his hangover mild; the desert in his mouth being the most prevalent. He shuts the door a tad loudly as he panics for a second, not sure what to do after he flushes the toilet.

Think unsexy thoughts, think unsexy thoughts…

He rinses his mouth and then cups handful after handful of water to his lips, slurping and swallowing. He burps, wipes his mouth. Seeing himself in the mirror, he splashes cold water on his face and continually tries to think unsexy things.

It doesn't work. All he can think about is Marianne in his bed, just on the other side of the door, her bra on the floor and her shirt riding up the way it twisted when she rolled over, and the fullness of her ass and how warm she felt beside him –

Shitshitshit. "Stop it, you ugly fucker. You're making it worse," he whispers, voice going in and out from the grogginess of sleep and hangover. He slashes his face with cold water one more time before dabbing it dry and hoping, as he emerges, that Marianne is still face down and maybe he can get away with lying facing away from her so she doesn't at all accidentally discover the partial erection in his loose pants.

She is, he finds, still lying on one half of the bed, face turned toward the end table, the rise and fall of her back indicating that she went back to sleep. He coolly tip-toes to his side of the bed, climbs in. He lies on his side, his back to her, and checks his clock.

It's barely ten in the morning. Good, we're good… Marianne doesn't work until seven tonight, and he can always choose not to go in himself. He tries to breathe normally, tries to relax and go back to sleep.

No such luck, thanks to Marianne.

She yawns, stretches. She straightens out the tangles sheets, then shimmies closer to Bog. She presses a kiss between his shoulder blades, idly tickle-scratching his skin at the base of his spine. He shivers pleasantly and doesn't know what to do when her tickling hand runs flat up his ribs and onto his arm, giving his shoulder an affectionate squeeze.

"G'morning," she greets, sleepy, but clear-headed. She huffs a small chuckle. "I'm afraid to stand up. My head weighs five hundred pounds."

Bog's inner mantra is the equivalent of an internet meme, flames all around and him sitting in the center thinking as it all burns: _This is fine. This is fine. This is fine…_

Marianne rolls onto her back, sighs. "Don't tell me you're asleep again already. Men, I swear… My dad can do the same thing. I'll be watching a movie with him, I'll say something and hell respond, then I look over a minute later, and he's out like a light."

"I'm awake," Bog chooses to voice. He's not sure how to react.

Marianne smiles. He can even hear it in her voice when she says, "I know I goofed it up in the end, but I had a lot of fun last night."

"Me too," he says, although it goes without saying. He just doesn't want to roll over. Thankfully, the panic is helping to kill the arousal.

"And I do remember everything, thank you."

"…I was afraid you might."

"Why?" she says, and she's sitting up. She reaches over to tug his down to lie on his back. He looks up at her, and all he sees is her unadulterated affection beaming down at him, and God, that's too much. "You were nothing but sweet to me. I'm the one who overreacted when I didn't get the reaction I thought I would. But it was stupid of me to slip up in the first place," she says, shifting to prop herself up on her elbow, head in her hand, her body barely an inch away from his. "But that doesn't mean I don't mean it. I keep going around in circles about it, afraid to get hurt, but – But I realized last night that acting damaged is like making myself the victim of the past, and I'm no victim. So I need to stop being scared."

What she says resonates so deeply within Bog that he inhales sharply and sits up, looking at her. She sits up too, and their eyes lock. He blinks. "You… you're right. I –"

She sways a little, holds her head. "Hold that thought."

She goes and uses the restroom, gets s drink of water in a glass from the kitchen, chugs the whole thing. Bog idly plays with a slight tear at the corner of his blanket. When she returns, she sits down cross-legged in front of him. He returns his gaze to her.

She opens her mouth to say something, and he cuts her off. "I love you, Marianne."

Her smile slowly eats at her face. Then she laughs, shakes her head. "Dammit. You did beat me to the punch after all." She lightly jabs his shoulder, then leans over with her hand on the same shoulder for balance to plant a kiss on his chin, right over some of his scars. Then she kisses his jaw, the corner of his mouth, his lips.

Bog wraps his arms around her and tugs them both backward to lie in bed again, her weight atop him feeling welcome and natural. She squeals with laughter and wraps her arms around him, and he kisses her again.

"I love you," she answers, and this time, he believes her. He was victimizing himself before, feeling unworthy and somehow guilty, as if he dragged her to say it, only able to say it when drunk. Why did he doubt her like that? Why did he doubt _himself_ like that? Especially when they can be like this, bodies close and lips closer, and it's so apartment that she wants him and he wants her and no one is settling and no one is lying and neither of them would rather be anywhere else right now.

After more kissing and rolling onto their sides to hold one another and part for air, Bog meekly inquires, "So… are we dating now?"

"I think we've _been_ dating," Marianne snorts. "The friendship portion of the relationship was all a ruse."

"No!" Bog exclaims dramatically. He places a hand over his heart. "Now that cuts me deep, Miss Du Fae. I was never your friend?"

She laughs and taps the end of his beak. "Never. I was secretly plotting to date you all along."

"Now that's unfair and untrue," he remarks. "You cannae possibly have when I was the one secretly plotting to date you all along."

"Now I _know_ you're lying! You _hated_ me at first."

"Only because I thought we connected at the bookstore, and then you shunned me."

"I did not! I was checking you out and didn't want to get caught."

"Uh-huh. More lies. Then explain your desire to beat me up?"

"It was sparring, first of all, and second of all, you wanted to, too, and THIRD of all, it was also a ruse, just an excuse to get close to you," she counts off on her fingers, then grins at him.

Bog laughs, covering his face with his hand. He drops it and stares at her, but there is nothing but mirth in his eyes, and even the mischief in her own gaze softens to affection.

She kisses him again, long and slow.

"Let's get those matching tattoos."

"T'dae?" he says fuzzily over her mouth. "Plum will be thrilled."

"Today," she agrees. "And fuck work, I'm calling in. I only work, like, four and a half hours anyway."

"You're sick," he says for her. "You have a raging headache."

She snorts. "Not as raging as your boner." She slaps her hand over her mouth and pulls back. "Oh, shit, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to make that joke aloud!"

He blushes furiously but can't help but start laughing, rolling away onto his back with his hand over his eyes, just laughing while his cheeks and ears burn.

"Bog! Bog, come on! Don't laugh at me – it was a Fruedian slip! Come on, you don't – wait, do you actually…?"

She hopefully will think he's joking if he's honest. He lifts his hand and admits, "Since I woke up, Snugglebug. And it's all your fault." He can't believe he's saying it. He blames his hangover for muddling his thoughts. Yeah.

She groans and flops down, covering her own face, flaring up red as she, too, starts laughing uncontrollably.

"We're immature. We're not teenagers, for God's sake."

"I know. I'm almost thirty."

"Yeah, but men mature slower than girls. We're about the same maturity level."

"I cannot believe you!" Bog gasps, feigning a major offense. "I've been insulted. Disrespected. I've been mistreated."

She pauses her laughter to look at him, brows raised, and then only squeaks another laugh. "Stop. I can't. I can't deal with… with both of these things at once."

He leans down and kisses her hands where they cover her face. She sighs, drops them, opens her eyes. He kisses her again, full on the mouth, and she cups the back of his neck and up through his air.

"I need to text Dawn."

"Oh? Why's that? Is the Mother Hen worried about her Chickadee?"

Marianne snorts. "No. I just need to tell her that it was a date after all, and that she can stop pestering me now."

"Well, I'm in no rush to tell my mum that she was right all along. She'll only rub it in me face."

Marianne makes a face. "Ehh… you're right. Dawn will, too. Yeah, it can wait." She rolls them over, straddling him. She kisses him passionately, letting everything she's kept bottled up toward him for months now all come bleeding out. "I'm going to be too busy to text."

"Oh?" he questions, and then feels her hands spread across his chest and her mouth come teasingly close to his neck. "… _Oh._ " He understands.

Marianne smirks and they don't get out of Bog's bed for a while.


	15. Fifteen: Aftermath

It's late March, it's Spring Break, Easter is right around the corner, and it's a relieving fifty-five degrees after months of hanging around zero.

The winter went by quickly, it seems; it's easy to stay warm when there's another body nearby.

Marianne covers Bog's left hand with her own; below the second knuckle of their thumbs, right in the meat of it, are a few words in a handmade font from Sugar Plum herself: Tough Girl for her, Tough Guy for him. She kisses his cheek.

Then she leans back and puts her helmet on, right as he puts on his own. He revs the engine.

"Ready, love?" he calls over his shoulder, over the roar of his bike.

She wraps her arms rightly around his torso and shouts back, "You know it!"

And they ride.

It feels like flying.

* * *

Marianne gets a job at King's Castle to be closer to Bog and Griselda, whom, upon the discovery that her favorite regular is one and the same as the girl who her son befriended and whom melted her son's heart, was overjoyed and all-welcoming and insistent on marriage and children and already planning for their firstborn to take over the bar next. Marianne calmed the woman to take this one step at a time, but she felt inside that she was right; Bog was The One, ye olde fabled and once thought impossible to find, yet holds true.

So Marianne serves or helps make drinks or cleans dishes or bathrooms, depending on her mood, depending on who calls in, depending on where Bog is situated. He bounces between bartending and the kitchen more often now; having Marianne around improves his temper, he finds. They keep each other in check.

Bog and Marianne save up to find a bigger apartment than Bog's, but a smaller one than the one she shares with her sister and Sunny, whom now want their own space for the same reasons Marianne wants hers.

Sunny makes a big break; he's secretly been going to auditions for talent-scouting TV shows, in between going to work or school or out with Dawn. He finally lands one that likes his voice, his creative mash-ups, and can sell his face.

He makes enough money to open up a nest egg, moving himself and Dawn to a small house, one ironically cheaper to rent than the three-bedroom apartment. They're engaged within the year. It doesn't take long to get to that point when someone dates someone they've known nearly their whole life. It just falls into place.

Marianne is the maid of honor, Bog is her plus one. Dawn is the most radiant bride Marianne has ever seen, and while Marianne was busy being a maidzilla to keep everything orderly and perfect for her precious baby sister, Dawn was the angel that came in and smoothed everything over. The ceremony is short and small, to save money. She and Sunny take a luxurious honeymoon to a private bungalow in the Caribbean with the wedding money they saved.

The pressure to be wed weighs heavily down on Marianne and Bog, but they don't cave in. They take their sweet time, content to finish their schooling while living together, working together, riding together. They don't get married until after they have both gotten their degrees, even when Bog completes his sooner. He waits, lets nothing distract Marianne from her goals.

Bog expands his range, making a move to own another bar in town, but Marianne encourages a restaurant instead, with Bog as head chef as well as owner. He agrees, they open it up, and he now spends all his nights at the new '50s-diner-style eatery, Butterfly Marsh. He gives King's Castle to his fiancé, Marianne. He debated this decision for a long time, worried he wasn't keeping it in the family, but Griselda came through with exactly what he needed to hear: that by giving it to Marianne, he was keeping it in the family.

They eloped to Las Vegas and for a weekend at Disney Land California as a honeymoon shortly after the establishment of the diner, once it was stable.

It's a cross-country trip on their bikes the whole way there and back.

It's the most blissful two weeks of their lives.

And it never ends.

There are arguments, stubbornness; there are spats and quarrels over money and the ride and fall of their businesses and whether or not if they want or are ready for children; it goes on and on. But there are also make-ups and long periods of comfortable peace and decisions made and minds changed.

They get cats instead of kids. Seven more to join Bones, during and after his time. Some of the cats are strays taken in and taken care of; some are adopted from shelters who have scars, like themselves; missing eyes, limbs, bits of ears. Some are perfectly healthy and are gotten since kittenhood from ads in the paper. All of them are well loved and fed and cared for.

Neither of them feel the ache of not being a parent; it disappoints Griselda, but she understands. She supports them. She lives to a very ripe old age, strong until the end.

They keep their matching tattoos fresh. Every time the black ink fades or gets fuzzy, they go back in and get it freshened up, with or without Plum at the parlor, even after the woman moves on to the West.

It's not perfect. It doesn't go as smoothly as Dawn and Sunny's marriage, because they cooperate more than they compromise, they have three beautiful, energetic, kind-hearted children. But Bog and Marianne don't need it to be perfect. They're both rough around the edges, but rough the way cogs fit together. They're both fiery, but what's life without some spice? They make it work, even if they sometimes both lose something. It works, and they wouldn't trade it for the Sunshine couple's life, nor for the world.

It's theirs and it's fate and it brought them together, and nothing on Earth can tear them apart now.

* * *

 _A/N: Sorry for the brevity and change in style; I rewrote this chapter, like, three or four times? I tried to do certain scenes/scenery/poeticisms, certain dialogues... but in the end, not everything I wanted to include was in there, so... instead, I typed out a summary narrative of sorts. I hope it's okay. There is just... not one good way to finish this fic, it seems. I probably should have ended it with chapter fourteen. :/_


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